[House Hearing, 113 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
TSA OVERSIGHT: EXAMINING THE SCREENING PARTNERSHIP PROGRAM
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS
of the
COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT
AND GOVERNMENT REFORM
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
JANUARY 14, 2014
__________
Serial No. 113-95
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.fdsys.gov
http://www.house.gov/reform
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
87-353 WASHINGTON : 2014
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office,
http://bookstore.gpo.gov. For more information, contact the GPO Customer Contact Center, U.S. Government Printing Office. Phone 202�09512�091800, or 866�09512�091800 (toll-free). E-mail, [email protected].
COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM
DARRELL E. ISSA, California, Chairman
JOHN L. MICA, Florida ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland,
MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio Ranking Minority Member
JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York
PATRICK T. McHENRY, North Carolina ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of
JIM JORDAN, Ohio Columbia
JASON CHAFFETZ, Utah JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts
TIM WALBERG, Michigan WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri
JAMES LANKFORD, Oklahoma STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts
JUSTIN AMASH, Michigan JIM COOPER, Tennessee
PAUL A. GOSAR, Arizona GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia
PATRICK MEEHAN, Pennsylvania JACKIE SPEIER, California
SCOTT DesJARLAIS, Tennessee MATTHEW A. CARTWRIGHT,
TREY GOWDY, South Carolina Pennsylvania
BLAKE FARENTHOLD, Texas TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois
DOC HASTINGS, Washington ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois
CYNTHIA M. LUMMIS, Wyoming DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois
ROB WOODALL, Georgia PETER WELCH, Vermont
THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky TONY CARDENAS, California
DOUG COLLINS, Georgia STEVEN A. HORSFORD, Nevada
MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina MICHELLE LUJAN GRISHAM, New Mexico
KERRY L. BENTIVOLIO, Michigan Vacancy
RON DeSANTIS, Florida
Lawrence J. Brady, Staff Director
John D. Cuaderes, Deputy Staff Director
Stephen Castor, General Counsel
Linda A. Good, Chief Clerk
David Rapallo, Minority Staff Director
Subcommittee on Government Operations
JOHN L. MICA, Florida, Chairman
TIM WALBERG, Michigan GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia
MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio Ranking Minority Member
JUSTIN AMASH, Michigan JIM COOPER, Tennessee
THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky MARK POCAN, Wisconsin
MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Hearing held on January 14, 2014................................. 1
WITNESSES
Mr. Kelly C. Hoggan, Assistant Administrator for Security
Operations, Transportation Security Administration
Oral Statement............................................... 8
Written Statement............................................ 10
Mr. Mark Bell, Acting Deputy Inspector General for Audits, U.S.
Department of Homeland Security, Office of the Inspector
General
Oral Statement............................................... 15
Written Statement............................................ 17
Ms. Jennifer Grover, Acting Director, Homeland Security and
Justice, Government Accountability Office
Oral Statement............................................... 26
Written Statement............................................ 28
APPENDIX
The Hon. John Mica, a Member of Congress from the State of
Florida, Opening Statement..................................... 58
Questions for Mr. Bell submitted by Rep. Connolly................ 60
TSA OVERSIGHT: EXAMINING THE SCREENING PARTNERSHIP PROGRAM
----------
Tuesday, January 14, 2014,
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Government Operations,
Committee on Oversight and Government Reform,
Washington, D.C.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:08 a.m. in
room 2154, Rayburn House Office Building, the Honorable John L.
Mica [chairman of the subcommittee], presiding.
Present: Representatives Mica, Turner, Amash, Meadows and
Connolly.
Staff Present: Will L. Boyington, Majority Press Assistant;
Daniel Bucheli, Majority Assistant Clerk; John Cuaderes,
Majority Deputy Staff Director; Linda Good, Majority Chief
Clerk; Mitchell S. Kominsky, Majority Counsel; Eric Cho,
Majority Detailee; Jaron Bourke, Minority Director of
Administration; Devon Hill, Minority Research Assistant; and
Julia Krieger, Minority New Media Press Secretary.
Mr. Mica. Good morning, everyone.
Welcome to the Subcommittee on Government Operations'
hearing this morning. The title of today's hearing is ``TSA
Oversight: Examining the Screening Partnership Program.''
We are pleased to have several members join us today.
The order of business will be, first of all, we will have
opening statements from any of the members attending. I will
recognize Mr. Connolly in just a few minutes. Then we will turn
to our panel of witnesses. We will hear from them and then go
through a series of questions to the panel and witnesses who
are participating today.
Mr. Issa always starts off with a colloquy that states how
important our responsibility is which is to conduct oversight.
We are the stewards of taxpayer dollars. We created these
programs through legislation like TSA and from time to time, we
have a responsibility to conduct oversight to make certain they
are run as efficiently, economically and effectively as
possible. That is the purpose of our being here today.
I have an opening statement the staff wrote and will insert
that as part of the record.
Mr. Mica. I wrote my own at 3:00 a.m. this morning. It is a
bit different but I had some time to think about it and I
thought I would give my commentary.
First, I would say to Mr. Connolly, Mr. Meadows and the
staff, in the last few weeks TSA has been fairly cooperative
and provided us with more information than we received in the
past, and I appreciate the working relationship.
Other than that, the reason we are here is, as I mentioned
to Mr. Meadows and Mr. Connolly, I was one of the people who
helped create TSA. I actually picked the name myself and with
other members of Congress, we enacted the legislation pretty
rapidly after the events of 9/11. President Bush wanted the
legislation on his desk by Thanksgiving and we did deliver it.
The country had been hit by the most significant terrorist
attack since probably World War II when they struck us at Pearl
Harbor. We needed to act, we needed an effective transportation
security operation, and we tried to do that.
We made some mistakes and have tried to correct them. We
have worked with a number of administrators and some
outstanding people. I remember Michael Jackson, for example. We
also lost jurisdiction for sometime. We started in
Transportation and shifted the TSA over to Homeland Security. I
think part of the problem is that it is an agency with 200,000
and some personnel. Combining 22 agencies and make it work does
not always work well.
That being said, when we started to change the way we
screen passengers, we never intended TSA to operate aviation
passenger screening forever. As a compromise, we set up five
initial airports with private screening under federal
supervision.
Let me say at this conjuncture, I have never advocated
going back to having the airlines do that or take away the
government's responsibility. I think it is important that we
maintain that. If you analyze the events of 2001 and the
terrorist attack, it was the government that failed, not the
private screening.
The government failed for several years to put in place
standards for screening. The government failed for several
years to put in rules governing what could be taken on a plane.
For example, box cutters were not prohibited at that time, all
of which led to the events of September 11.
When we set up the screening program, we had all federal
screening for most of the airports. For the first two years, we
initially created five airports, one in each size category,
with private screening under federal supervision. We tested the
performance of the two models after some two years and the GAO,
which independently looked at them, came up with a report. The
report said that private screening under federal supervision
performed statistically significantly better--not my words,
their words.
After that, as TSA saw applications for privatization, they
began a campaign to make certain that airports did not opt out.
They had a very hostile attitude toward taking that option
which intimidated some of the airports right up to several
years ago when one of my airports, the Sanford Airport, said
they had enough of the way TSA was operating and wanted to opt
out.
I got a call from the airport director who said he was
never so disgusted. They tried to intimidate him, they were
rude, offensive and threatening which prompted me to get re-
engaged. Here we are today as a result of TSA's action, not
mine.
I worked with other members when we passed the FAA
reauthorization bill. President Obama signed it into law
February two years ago next month. In that bill we went from
the language in the original law that said an airport can
submit an application to opt out and TSA may accept it to
language which said ``TSA shall accept the application to opt
out.'' Members of Congress, like myself and others, were
frustrated with what was going on.
That was two years ago. Here we are at this oversight
hearing this morning. Basically what happened in those two
years is TSA has performed a clever, slow roll out of
implementation of the provisions we requested. In fact, the
January 2013 TSA report, ``Screening Partnership Annual
Report,'' says none of the three major goals towards
implementing private screening were completed. That is their
report, all top priorities and none of them were met.
As a result of this hearing, my airport which has been
waiting now some two years finally got notification on Friday
or some time soon that they are moving forward with an RFP
which is almost two years later. That is not what we intended
and that is not why we are here.
I might also say for the record that the United States is
now one of the very few western countries with an all Federal
passenger screening system. Bulgaria, Romania and Poland are a
few of the western states that keep an all government force in
place. Almost every other nation, including those hit hard by
terrorist threats--Israel and the U.K.--use private screening
under federal supervision which is the model we anticipated
would be in place by now.
Unfortunately, TSA is both regulator, administrator,
operator, auditor and contractor. That creates a conflict and
there have been recent articles saying that model needs to be
changed. I believe that TSA should set the rules, conduct the
audits and get out of the personnel business.
The agency has grown from 16,500 screeners after 9/11 to
66,000 employees, 51,000 screeners and 15,000 administrative
personnel. The personnel work hard and there are some very
dedicated screeners and employees. They make, on average,
$38,000 apiece. We spend $1.1 billion on 15,000 administrators
and spend $1.9 billion on the rest of the 51,000 personnel.
Something is wrong in those numbers.
We only have about 457 airports. If you have 15,000
administrators--do the math--that means you have 30
administrators for every airport in the country. Thirty-five
airports handle 75 percent of the passengers. There obviously
is something wrong in our distribution of administration
funding.
Also, most of the reports--I have just a few of them here--
also prompted us to put into law the requirement they shall
accept the application. In the past, when we had TSA perform a
review of the cost of screening, private screening versus all
federal screening, they cooked the books and did not include
elements of costs that should be applied and tried to tell
folks they cost more than the all federal program which defies
logic. GAO came back and said they did cook the books.
One of the considerations we did put in the law was we
should look at cost. They used that provision to slow roll and
are not being transparent. Again, that is regrettable.
In most areas dealing with private screening partnership,
they have unfortunately acted arbitrarily. The acquisition and
contract process has been a disaster. We have ended up in court
and some of the awards have been delayed.
I was talking with Mr. Moran on the way over here and he
talked about the delays at Dulles and some of the other
airports and how they were having trouble recruiting people.
You may know the history of recruitment in the Washington area
by advertising for personnel on the top of pizza boxes or
advertisements above discount gas pumps.
The retention, particularly in the metropolitan area,
continues to be a problem. The solution for dealing with having
people on the job, the national screening force and other costs
incurred, as studies have all shown, continues to be a huge
problem.
I will not get into all of the reports that have criticized
TSA but as we know we have had horrible experience with
acquisition of personnel, retention and training but also have
had fiascos with purchase of the puffers for hundreds of
millions of dollars and ended up destroying them and most
recently taking out half a billion dollars' worth of
backscatter equipment from the airport. Staff should track and
see where those have gone.
These are not my reports. We have had reports on the
Behavior Detection Program which recommends stopping that
program because it is ineffective.
Today's focus is primarily on the Screening Partnership
Program and trying to make that work. I will be introducing
legislation sometime in the next month which will require all
TSA to opt out all airports within 24 months of the President
signing the bill and all airports have the model we intended--
to get TSA out of the personnel and human resources business
and into the security and intelligence business.
Even though we passed the law and said you must accept
these applications, almost none have actually moved forward.
Again, that is a slow roll purposely to ignore the intent of
Congress.
I am also concerned that I have reports that the Screening
Partnership Office in TSA is in disarray, that the major
knowledgeable people have left and I think we may want to look
at moving the contracting from TSA for the screening services
to an agency like GSA which routinely does this.
We have private screening under federal supervision for our
nuclear facilities, for our defense facilities and for a host
of very sensitive operating positions. Yet, we have a disaster
in a program intended to be crafted quite differently.
Those are some of my long opening comments. I have a bit
more history than some of the other members but I wanted to
share with you how we got to this stage and this oversight.
I have also asked staff from the Appropriations Committee
to attend this hearing and staff from the authorizing committee
because we can conduct oversight but they control the money and
the policy. I am expecting them to also act so that we get to
where Congress intended us to be on this issue.
Mr. Connolly.
Mr. Connolly. Thank you so much, Chairman Mica. Thank you
for holding today's oversight hearing on the Transportation
Security Administration's Screening Partnership Program.
Following September 11, Congress established TSA to
safeguard our Nation's commercial aviation transportation
system. Today, TSA is responsible for screening airline
passengers and baggage at more than 450 airports throughout the
United States.
In 2004, TSA created the SPP to enable commercial airport
operators to apply to forego federal screeners in favor of
qualified private sector screening contractors that meet
federal standards and who operate under federal oversight.
There are currently 14 airports where passenger screening
is performed by private contractors and 6 additional airports
awaiting contract awards, which I understand will be announced
later this year. Of these 20 airports, nearly half are small
airports located in the State of Montana.
In 2012, the Government Accountability Office performed and
assessment of the performance of SPP airports. While the
details of that analysis remain classified, GAO did find that
some SPP airports perform slightly above the national average
on some measures, while others perform slightly below.
GAO also recommended in this report that TSA develop a
mechanism to monitor performance of private screeners versus
federal screeners. TSA concurred with the recommendation and
has begun the long overdue process of evaluating private sector
screening performance to ensure air travel remains secure.
Although the detailed results of these assessments are
sensitive or classified, I nonetheless look forward to hearing
what is being done to correct sub par performance where
identified.
Proponents of the expanding the SPP program assert that
private screeners improve efficiency and reduce costs compared
to federal screeners. However, TSA's cost estimates have found
the opposite concluding that private screening costs are
generally between three to nine percent higher than federal
screening.
In light of that discrepancy between cost saving claims and
certainly the Chairman's legitimate concerns over the validity
of the cost estimate methodology, I am interested in examining
the matter closely to ensure that Congress and TSA utilize the
most accurate performance and cost data available so that we
can be properly informed about oversight, operations and the
possibility of future legislation.
It is no secret that debates over TSA often elicit strong
reactions from members and the public alike, often stemming
from anecdotal yet very real instances of inconvenience and
perceived poor customer service. Mr. Hoggan, I shared with you
my own unhappy anecdotal experience most recently.
Security is our main focus but it cannot be our only focus.
Given the fact we are interacting with the public to the tune
of millions and millions and millions of passengers, it seems
to me that some emphasis on training of proper customer
interaction is very important. It is important how we treat the
American citizen and it is important how we treat our foreign
guests. Both deserve dignity at an airport.
It is a stressful enough situation for the passenger. It is
also stressful for the TSA because they have an awesome
responsibility. We do sympathize with that and we respect it
but we also need to respect the passengers we are asking to
cooperate. When we mistreat them by barking orders at them as
if they are cattle, not people, we actually diminish the spirit
of cooperation and do not enhance it.
As I indicated to you privately before this hearing, Mr.
Hoggan, I do not understand why that cannot be a simple matter
of training. I do not understand how hard it is to teach people
to make sure you use the words ``please'' and ``thank you''
when interacting with our public and show that basic respect.
In my experience this last weekend--going out and I took
the redeye back--I encountered 20 barked orders but never once
the world ``please'' with any of the TSA people I encountered--
take that off, move over there, back up, put your hands up,
take your shoes off. Not once was the word ``please'' used.
That lack of courtesy shows a lack of respect for the
public with whom you are dealing, a public that is unbelievably
tolerant of how it is being treated. Maybe that has something
to do with the culture of airports these days where many
American airlines seem actually to resent having customers and
that lack of respect has become part of the culture of air
travel.
When we represent the Federal Government or are overseeing
private sector entities taking over some of these
responsibilities, we have to show a respect for the public
understanding their cooperation is essential to our mission. I
do not think it is a trivial issue. I do not think it is a nice
thing to do if we have time. I think it is integral to the
mission of security.
If I cannot get assurances that we are going to take that
seriously and redouble our efforts to make sure TSA agents or
the private sector analogs are properly trained in how to deal
in customer service and show respect for the public we are
serving, then we will have to do something legislatively about
it. I am going to insist and I know I will not have any
resistance on the other side of the aisle on that.
I am going to use this hearing today, Mr. Hoggan, to get
some assurance from you because I have had it. I think a lot of
the public has had it. There is no excuse for it. We have to
take it seriously.
I am doubly grateful for this hearing because this is one
of my pet peeves. I have mentioned it many times over the five
years have been on this job. I see no improvement at all in my
own experience in the airports.
If necessary, one thing we might do since my colleagues,
unlike me--I live here, I do not have to travel as Mr. Bell
knows--but my colleagues are on a plane at least twice a week
going home and coming back. If we do not get some satisfaction,
I am going to use my colleagues as a filter. Tell us about your
experience and by the way, let us encourage the public to tell
a member of Congress. We will feed it all to you, Mr. Hoggan,
so then you will have to deal with it because we will make a
big issue of it.
Either we deal with this and respect the public we are
serving, understanding we have a stressful mission--by the way,
enormous respect goes to TSA, to you, Mr. Hoggan, and your
colleagues, for the fact that thank God, we have not had a
recurrence of 9/11.
Cumbersome though it is, uncomfortable, stressful, we have
been focused properly on the mission and so far, thank God, it
has worked. That does not mean we cannot make the process
better and as I said, create a framework that fosters more
cooperation, willingness and understanding from the public, not
less.
Forgive the lecture but you can see I have enormous
frustration with the experience I see the public experiencing.
We have to do something about it. I hope we can do it
collaboratively, I hope we do not have to do it legislatively.
It is not really a complicated issue, but I can tell you what I
witness the public going through is unacceptable behavior by
federal civil servants.
I am one too and I do not like seeing my government
represented that way with so many millions of the public who
interact with these systems as they go to travel.
That is my plea and also it is going to be my insistence.
Thank you all for being here and I look forward to hearing
your testimony.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this hearing.
Mr. Mica. Thank you, Mr. Connolly.
Now to our Vice Chairman, Mr. Meadows.
Mr. Meadows. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this
hearing and thanks to each of you for coming. I will be very,
very brief.
Mr. Connolly has said it well. I guess part of the
frustration you are hearing is that there is no federal agency
that really is representative of the Federal Government to the
vast majority of people where they actually come in contact
with a federal employee other than TSA. You really are the face
of the Federal Government. Your efficiencies or inefficiencies,
your manners or lack thereof is a broad brush approach.
I think you have many very dedicated, capable, fine public
servants. I appreciate the fact that we have safety, but as Mr.
Connolly so eloquently put it, what happens is I get more
complaints about TSA's efficiency but more importantly their
rude behavior and how they treat passengers than almost
anything else.
I challenge you to look from a customer service perspective
on how we can effectively change this because if not, there
will be great bipartisan support to find a private sector. We
are talking about that partnership today but there will be
great bipartisan support to find a private sector, more
customer friendly way of doing it.
I do that in the spirit of saying the responsibility you
have is great in terms of the viability long term of your
particular agency.
I want to apologize because I am going to have to step out
and be back and forth. I have a Transportation and
Infrastructure hearing this morning going on right now for the
highway bill but I will be back and forth.
Thank each of you. I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Mica. I thank the gentleman.
Now we will turn to our panel of witnesses. Today we have
three witnesses. We have Mr. Kelly Hoggan, Assistant
Administrator for Security Operations, TSA; Mr. Mark Bell,
Acting Deputy Inspector General for Audits, U.S. Department of
Homeland Security, Office of the Inspector General; and Ms.
Jennifer Grover, Acting Director, Homeland Security and
Justice, Government Accountability Office.
I would like to welcome all of our witnesses. I am not sure
if you have been before us before but if you have a lengthy
statement or some documentation you would like to be included
in the record as part of the hearing, you can request that
through the Chair or a member.
This is also an investigative subcommittee of Congress and
we do swear our witnesses. Please stand and raise your right
hand.
Do you solemnly swear or affirm that the testimony you are
about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing
but the truth?
[Witnesses respond in the affirmative.]
Mr. Mica. Thank you.
Let the record reflect that the witnesses answered in the
affirmative.
As a matter of business, members may have seven days to
submit opening statements for the record.
Mr. Connolly, I would like to keep the record open for two
weeks because I think we are going to have additional
questions. Without objection, we will take members' statements
for seven days and keep the record open for addressing
additional questions to our witnesses over the next several
weeks.
With that, we will recognize and welcome Kelly C. Hoggan,
Assistant Administrator for Security Operations of TSA. Welcome
and you are recognized.
WITNESS STATEMENTS
STATEMENT OF KELLY C. HOGGAN
Mr. Hoggan. Chairman Mica, Ranking Member Connolly and
members of the subcommittee, I am pleased to appear before you
today to discuss the Transportation Security Administration's
Screening Partnership Program, SPP.
I am the Assistant Administrator for Security Operations at
GSA and have been in this position for eight months. I have
served in a variety of leadership roles in TSA since 2004.
Prior to joining TSA, I worked in the airline industry for
18 years. My experience covers many areas at TSA and airline
operations including staffing allocation, resource management,
technology development and capabilities and international
aviation.
Congress, through the Aviation and Transportation Security
Act, established TSA and required the establishment of pilot
programs under which airports may apply to utilize private
sector rather TSA employees to conduct front line screening.
As directed by ATSA, TSA selected five airports to
participate in the pilot program representing five risk
categories. SPP grew out of this pilot program which ended in
2004. Today, out of approximately 450 commercial service
airports, 14 have contractors performing screening, including
the original five pilot airports.
Of those 14 airports, 7 fall within the smallest
classification meaning they emplane between 2,500 and 10,000
passengers a year. These 14 airports represent approximately
four percent of the passenger screening positions across the
system.
Applications from six additional airports have been
approved and are currently in the contract solicitation
process. I would note that since passage of the FAA
Modernization and Reform Act of 2012, all SPP applications
received have been approved within the 120 day time limit. Once
approved for admission to SPP, contract solicitation and
selection are completed in accordance with federal acquisition
regulations.
Over the past eight months in my position as Assistant
Administrator for Security Operations I have taken steps to
further streamline application processing, improve the level of
experience and expertise assigned to the SPP Office and in
collaboration with my counterparts in the Office of
Acquisitions to establish a 12-month timeline goal for
application receipt and contract award.
For airport operators interested in SPP, the TSA website
includes the SPP application itself, an overview of the
application process and contact information for appropriate TSA
staff. TSA also utilizes the Federal Business Opportunities
website to communicate with a wide range of vendors.
For instance, TSA advertised and held an SPP industry day
on January 10, 2014. This event provided an overview of the
program, the acquisitions process and provided a forum for
questions and answers to the industry.
I believe the steps taken have strengthened the program and
made the program and application process more transparent to
interested parties.
Thank you for the opportunity to appear here today. I will
be happy to answer any questions.
[Prepared statement of Mr. Hoggan follows:]
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.001
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.002
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.003
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.004
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.005
Mr. Mica. Thank you. We will hold questions until we have
heard from all witnesses.
We will hear from Mr. Mark Bell next. He is the Acting
Deputy Inspector General for Audits at the U.S. Department of
Homeland Security, Office of the Inspector General. Welcome and
you are recognized.
STATEMENT OF MARK BELL
Mr. Bell. Good morning, Chairman Mica, Ranking Member
Connolly and members of the subcommittee.
Thank you for inviting me here today to testify on TSA's
Screening Partnership Program, known as SPP. My testimony will
focus on the results of our audit of this program which we
published in June 2013.
We performed this audit in response to a request from
Senators Roy Blunt and Bob Corker who had concerns about TSA's
management of SPP and the procurement process at Kansas City
International Airport.
In this program, TSA first reviews an airport's application
to participate and then if approved, procures private screening
services. At the time of our audit, 16 airports were in SPP.
Since that time, two airports have opted out, which means 14
are now participating. TSA has accepted 6 more airports but has
not yet awarded screening contracts.
We determined that although TSA administered SPP according
to federal law, it could improve its program administration.
Specifically, TSA did not adequately document its evaluation of
applications in its procurement decisions, did not always use
accurate information to determine program eligibility and did
not verify the accuracy of data used in its procurement
decisions.
As a result, TSA risked making incorrect decisions on SPP
applications, not selecting the best contractor and may have
missed opportunities to save money.
Until Congress passed the FAA Modernization and Reform Act
of 2012, TSA had no criteria to use when considering
applications to join the program. The 2012 Act including
requirements for approving applications, a timeline for
decisions and a requirement to report to applicants and
Congress about rejected applications.
TSA complied with the Act's requirements in approving five
applications submitted after its passage but some documents
related to its decisions including incorrect cost estimates and
other documents are not finalized.
We also identified missing details and inaccuracies in
documents supporting four of the five SPP procurement decisions
made between January 2011 and August 2012. For example, four
procurement files contained a similar short paragraph noting
the Source Selection Authority's decision and two of the eight
cost estimates had slight a difference in labor hours and
overtime rates.
In September 2011, a federal court concluded that TSA did
not document its independent analysis of an SPP contract for
Kansas City International Airport. Following this, TSA took
steps to ensure it fully documented its proposal analysis, its
decision rationale and the Source Selection Authority's
independence.
It also began to require documented support for its final
selection decisions. We reviewed the decision documentation for
a subsequent contract and confirmed that it included the
necessary details.
Under the 2012 Act, TSA must also consider cost efficiency
in deciding on an airport's admission into the program, but TSA
reported that none of the four applications approved since the
Act's passage had reached the cost evaluation phase, so we were
unable to determine TSA's compliance with this requirement.
However, in January 2013, the TSA Administrator directed
that cost efficiency be evaluated when deciding on continued
participation. TSA was also working on a methodology to
estimate the cost of converting SPP airports back to TSA
employee screening, but it had not yet determined the cost for
any airport currently in the program.
In our audit, we also noted that TSA's screening cost
estimates differed so they did not provide a consistent basis
for deciding program participation.
As a result of our audit, we recommended that TSA fully
document its decisions on program applications and procurements
and that it use relevant and accurate information in
determining eligibility in approving participation. TSA
concurred with both recommendations.
We closed the first recommendation because TSA had already
begun issuing policies and reminders and started revising the
application process. We considered our second recommendation to
be resolved because TSA is working to improve application
document review and cost estimates. The recommendation remains
open pending documented support of these actions.
Mr. Chairman, this concludes my prepared statement. I
welcome any questions you or other members of the subcommittee
may have.
[Prepared statement of Mr. Bell follows:]
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.006
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.007
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.008
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.009
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.010
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.011
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.012
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.013
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.014
Mr. Mica. Thank you again, Mr. Bell. We will defer
questions.
We will hear next from our final witness, Jennifer Grover,
Acting Director, Homeland Security and Justice, GAO. Welcome
and you are recognized.
STATEMENT OF JENNIFER GROVER
Ms. Grover. Good morning, Chairman Mica, Ranking Member
Connolly and other members and staff.
I am pleased to be here today to discuss TSA's
implementation and oversight of the Screening Partnership
Program.
The Screening Partnership Program, SPP, provides airports a
private alternative to federal screeners. As others have
already noted, of the Nation's 450 or so commercial airports,
14 participate in SPP and another 16 are waiting in the wings
for TSA to complete the contractor procurement process.
A year ago, GAO found weaknesses in TSA's implementation
and oversight of SPP. Regarding implementation, we found that
TSA was not providing clear guidance to airports on how to
apply to SPP. This is important to ensure that all airports
have a full and fair opportunity to participate.
Specifically, we found that TSA offered online FAQ's but
little else. Airports told us that they needed help with
several issues such as understanding whether or not they were
good candidates for the program, how to complete the
applications and specific guidance about what cost information
they were required to submit.
Industry representatives echoed those concerns noting that
airports were reluctant to invest in the application process
when they were unsure about how they would be evaluated.
Since then, consistent with our recommendations, TSA has
posted additional guidance on its website including examples of
helpful information that previous applicants provided,
information about how applications would be assessed and
clarification about the requirements for submitting cost
information.
Regarding oversight, we found that TSA did not evaluate the
relative performance of federal and private screeners. This is
important because private screeners must provide a level of
service and protection that is equal to or greater than that
provided by federal screeners. Therefore, we recommended that
TSA regularly monitor SPP performance compared to the
performance of federal screeners.
Specifically, we found that TSA used a scorecard
performance system to regularly assess screeners on numerous
performance measures at every airport. The result is a point in
time snapshot of performance at that airport relative to its
goals and national averages but not a comparison to all of the
airports in its category.
To address the question of comparative performance, GAO
reviewed several years of performance data for the then 16 SPP
airports on foreign measures. We found that private screeners
did slightly better than federal screeners on some measures and
slightly worse on others. However, we could not attribute the
differences in performance entirely to the use of private or
federal screeners due to other factors that can affect
performance.
Since then, TSA issued its first SPP annual report which,
consistent with our recommendations, includes comparative
performance information for each SPP airport relative to other
airports in its category. TSA also began verifying annually
that the level of screening services provided by private
airports is equal to or greater than the level that would be
provided by federal screeners.
We are pleased that TSA's changes address our
recommendations on SPP. These changes also may help TSA in
making future improvements to the program. For example, with
greater clarity and transparency in the application process,
additional airports may be encouraged to apply.
Greater clarity and transparency may also help ensure that
the application process is carried out in a uniform and
consistent manner.
With the new comparative performance information, TSA may
be better equipped to identify best practices as well as to
identify specific SPP airports that require additional
attention to improved performance.
Finally, a better understanding of how well SPP airports
operate could inform future decision-making about the program.
Chairman Mica, Ranking Member Connolly, thank you for the
opportunity to testify this morning and I look forward to your
questions.
[Prepared statement of Ms. Grover follows:]
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.015
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.016
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.017
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.018
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.019
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.020
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.021
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.022
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.023
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.024
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.025
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.026
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.027
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.028
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.029
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.030
Mr. Mica. Thank you. We will start with some questions.
Mr. Hoggan, it is now two years in February since the
President signed the bill that said TSA shall accept these
applications. How many airports have you accepted applications
for since then?
Mr. Hoggan. There were two, Sarasota-Bradenton and Sanford-
Orlando; four that were in Montana, Boozman.
Mr. Mica. As I told the Ranking Member, the decision on
Sanford was to put out an RFP last week. It has taken two years
to put out an RFP?
Mr. Hoggan. Yes, sir.
Mr. Mica. That is not acceptable. That is a slow roll,
dragging your feet as I described in the beginning. Congress
said you shall accept these.
The other thing we have is the question of cost. Again I go
back to some of the initial costs we looked at. Currently, you
have 51,000 screeners?
Mr. Hoggan. I have 48,000 screeners from a D-ban, part-
time, TSO to an I-ban transportation security manager.
Mr. Mica. But we have 66,000 employees. I don't know if you
have 20,000 administrators--that would floor me--but it is
estimated you have about 15,000 administrative positions.
Mr. Hoggan. I don't have 15,000. TSA, by my understanding
and allocations, has under 10,000, closer to 9,000.
Mr. Mica. We will go with your 9,000 figure. We have 450
airports divided by two. That is an average of 20
administrative positions for every airport in the country. Some
of these airports have two and three flights a day and just a
handful of passengers.
Mr. Hoggan. Out of the approximately 454 airports I have
right now, I have little over 2,100 administrative staff at the
airports. The rest in that allocation include the surface,
cargo, aviation inspectors.
Mr. Mica. I will give you an anecdotal experience at
Orlando where we pay on average, across the board, $38,000 for
screening personnel?
Mr. Hoggan. The exact average.
Mr. Mica. That is the information we got from you all.
I am leaving on one of the concourses and one of the
employees takes me aside and says, see those four TSA
employees, they are all making in the range of $100,000 sitting
on their butts. That is not efficient operations. That is
paying these people what amounts to almost minimum wage. We
still have in the very large airports very significant
turnover--not only in the large airports, you have some
airports in the Midwest where you have a boom right now--the
difficulty of finding personnel and you are sending in people.
We have the cost of sending in people for the national
screening force. They send them in, put them up in hotels, pay
them per diem--the screeners they have to employ to fill those
positions. The whole thing, if you add up the cost, there is
absolutely no way it can be more cost effective to run the
model you currently are operating.
Can we put up one of the slides. We went to Quebec City. To
be fair, we did emplanements. We got Rochester, one of the
original SPP airports. You still have 16 personnel there making
$80,000-$100,000 apiece. In Quebec City, they have one federal
person, probably UD2 if you use that to calculate. Again I see
the same thing.
At San Francisco, one of the original SPP airports, you
have 84 TSA personnel and you are spending $16 million,
$190,000 on average for those personnel. Not all that cost, to
be fair, is personnel cost in San Francisco, but it is very
similar. I used San Francisco and Toronto because Toronto has
huge international traffic in addition to San Francisco. Again,
you have 84 personnel at that airport and huge personnel costs.
I could go on through this. Your smaller airports, even
Jackson Hole, which has been private, the airport does its
screening, and you have six personnel. Some of those personnel
may cover some other airports at a cost of $763,000. Are you
counting this in your cost of the SPP operation?
Mr. Hoggan. For clarification, the numbers in San
Francisco, I know that was 2010 and in 2013, it was 64.
However, in the federal cost estimate we used, we take the
fully loaded cost for the FSD and staff. There are certain
positions which will stay in the federal government domain even
in an SPP, as you well know, as relates to compliance
inspectors and coronation centers and certain positions inside
the FSD staff.
When we look at an airport and look at their model between
federal and private, the difference between the fully loaded
that we calculate with federal and what we have with the
private SPP, there is an incremental difference between the
two. The difference is put into the federal cost estimate with
the FTE allocations and the total cost to support the contract
work at a manageable level.
The net is exactly the same between the two, whether it is
the federal or whether it is federal and the SPP contractor.
Mr. Mica. Again, you calculate some of those costs. You
could dismantle a great deal of your Washington personnel if
you have the private sector. Most of our costs in some of these
operations are personnel.
Mr. Hoggan. Absolutely correct.
Mr. Mica. Again, there is no discounting for the number of
personnel you do not need when you have a private operation.
There are models all over. I used Canada. I would be glad to
take you to the UK or Israel--again, highly impacted terrorist
threat. Yet we go on with the most expensive model with people
in some of these positions.
The other thing is we may need to get you out of this whole
contracting business. You are one of the few agencies that does
contract for these services. We may look at moving that over to
GSA and have them look at the contract.
Again, you can conduct oversight and audit and set the
rules and regulations. I have no problem with the Federal
Government setting standards. That is what they failed to do on
9/11 and that is what they need to responsibly continue to do
and audit the performance.
If the private screening is not working as well in some
instances, you get rid of them or it is corrected, but you
cannot tell me for a minute that it costs less for the Federal
Government to do this.
I was also telling Mr. Connolly one of the things private
screening has done is actually pay the screeners more--you are
aware of that--in some instances to retain them?
Mr. Hoggan. Perhaps they need to pay the commensurate
amount.
Mr. Mica. First, the conversion to private screening, now
we still have 16 waiting.
Mr. Hoggan. Six, sir.
Mr. Mica. She said 16.
Mr. Hoggan. I know she did. I would have to talk with her.
I have six.
Ms. Grover. I apologize, six.
Mr. Mica. If you have six waiting and have had several drop
out, the intimidation program is very effective. Now I
understand people who ask to opt out are also given old
equipment and also harassed.
Mr. Hoggan. That is not true, sir.
Mr. Mica. I know it is true. Do not tell me it is not true
because I know it is true. I know also that they are the last
for service of some of that equipment, for answers from TSA
which never come. I met with all the screening companies and
found out some of the things you do.
Where airlines change and come into an airport, you do not
allow a reasonable means of changing out the terms of the
contract. You are one of the few to put some caps on the way
you do and do not have a cooperative method of adjusting the
contract for additional responsibilities that are incurred.
Some airlines are new and some service airports but I am
just telling you what we are learning about your operations.
Again, we have several models you can look at.
One of the questions I also have is we have asked on
several occasions to disclose some of your operating costs. I
was given information that is termed procurement sensitive?
Mr. Hoggan. Correct.
Mr. Mica. I intend to release some of this information at
some time to those who are going to compete. We are going to
have to sit down and decide what is going to be disclosed so
that those who are competing have a transparent and open
process to know what your costs are and what they have to
compete against. I am just giving you advance warning.
Mr. Hoggan. I would appreciate the opportunity to have that
discussion with you about procurement sensitive information. I
will have our legislative office work with you on that.
Mr. Mica. Because I want them to be able to compete
honestly but they cannot do that unless they get honest answers
and the public should be able to see your exact costs.
Mr. Hoggan. I believe we have our exact costs.
Mr. Mica. And what they are going to have to compete for
now that you have set caps.
We are looking again and I appreciate your cooperation.
This is the first time we have gotten some of the information.
We are trying to decipher what costs should be attributed to
TSA as far as the federal screening and what costs should be
attributed to private screening under federal supervision so we
get a very clear picture.
The mandate by Congress was pretty clear. It should not
take two years to get this moving, which it has done.
I will come back. Let me go to Mr. Connolly.
Mr. Connolly. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to all
of our panelists for being here.
Mr. Hoggan, in looking at the omnibus continuing
resolution, which we anticipate we will be voting on tomorrow,
it cuts $336 million from DHS' budget, mostly for TSA, and it
caps the number of screeners at 46,000. If I heard you
correctly, you said right now you have about 48,000?
Mr. Hoggan. Yes, sir, but that also includes transportation
security managers and supervisors. They are in the same PPA
count but they are not screening officers.
Mr. Connolly. You could live with this cap?
Mr. Hoggan. I live with whatever my administrator
submitted.
Mr. Connolly. How disruptive are these limits or cuts from
your point of view in terms of your ability to fulfill your
mission?
Mr. Hoggan. I will be able to fulfill my job at the level
the Administrator supported.
Mr. Connolly. You will?
Mr. Hoggan. Yes.
Mr. Connolly. Could you walk us through, I would like to
better understand the process of hiring, career fulfillment and
so forth. How do we recruit someone to be a TSA screener?
Mr. Hoggan. A multitude of ways. The primary way is posting
on USA Jobs in the different locales where we have the
vacancies. We end up having job fairs and opportunities at some
locations where security directors come in, other locations it
is staff and we give a pre-employment overview of what the job
entails to ensure people understand it is a very difficult job.
As you stated, we interact with 1.8 million passengers a
day and screen 1.2 million bags a day. Over the course of a
year that is a long period of time. It is a very, very
demanding job. As I have said in town halls when I travel the
Nation, it is the most difficult job in the Federal Government
because they have to be on their game for everything they have
to do in the security effectiveness environment all the time
while at the same time providing the customer service and
interaction with the American traveling public and our foreign
guests, as you said.
It is a difficult job. We do a lot of previews, we do some
job fairs and we have information on USA Jobs and other means
as well.
Mr. Connolly. You do background checks?
Mr. Hoggan. Absolutely.
Mr. Connolly. Once you have made a job offer to someone,
what kind of training do they go through for the job?
Mr. Hoggan. You have initial OJT training, initial new hire
training over 80 hours and then you have OJT or on the job
training for an additional 40 hours. That is for a basic
officer, entry level. There is additional training provided for
unique types of equipment that you would use as well. That is
incremental on top of that.
Mr. Connolly. The basic orientation is a combination of 120
hours?
Mr. Hoggan. Yes, sir.
Mr. Connolly. Is customer service part of that training?
Mr. Hoggan. Yes, sir, it is. Customer service is an initial
part of the training. It is also in recurrent training. I will
commit to you that I will do a review and double the efforts
for that interaction.
For the record, I also want to satisfy some of your
questions. Recently, based on directions from our Deputy
Administrator--I think it had to do with some questions
Chairman Mica had and some others at the last hearing--we have
instituted integrity training across the enterprise at TSA.
There are situations and samples in there as relates to service
training.
We have also instituted leadership training for anyone who
manages any employees inside of TSA. They are required to have
specific leadership training. That service training was in
there as well.
I would also say for the record that currently today we are
averaging about 35 percent of the traveling public on any given
day, well over half a million individuals that come through our
aviation system are going through TSA pre-check. As a matter of
fact, the Administrator and the Secretary for Homeland Security
are at Dulles right now talking about a TSA enrollment site.
That changes the perspective of our passengers as well, as
well as the interaction of the officers when you have a
passenger go through pre-check as opposed to standard
screening. We believe that will also change and have a dramatic
effect on interaction with the traveling public.
Mr. Connolly. Every member of Congress is in the customer
service business. I have been in public life and elective life
19 years. I always say all of my constituents are wonderful.
Some are more wonderful than others. We experience what you
experience. People are not all the same. Some people are very
cooperative and some people can be less so.
While you are trying to do your job to make sure everyone
is secure in that airplane when they get on it and nothing gets
through, you also have to deal with the vagaries of different
personalities in very large numbers of people. It is a huge
challenge. I am sure if I had the responsibility there would be
a sense of great stress.
I still think it is not an either/or proposition. I still
think we can have high quality customer service and
satisfaction with also top notch fulfillment of our mission.
The two are not incompatible. In fact, they are compatible.
As I indicated, I happen to believe that the less pleasant
the experience because we do not get customer service right in
our interactions with the public we serve, I actually think it
contributes to less cooperation, resentment and a desire
frankly not to cooperate.
We do not want that. We want people understanding our
mission. As I said, I have been amazed since 9/11 at the level
of tolerance and acceptance by the public because they get the
tradeoff, but I think we can improve on that tradeoff. I think
we have to do that.
There is no excuse for someone barking orders continuously
at the public at any airport in America who is an employee of
the Federal Government or a contractor for the Federal
Government.
Mr. Hoggan. I would agree.
Mr. Connolly. I would lose my job if I treated the public
that way, and rightfully so. My staff would be fired if I found
they treated my public that way. We need to hold ourselves to
that standard. I fear it is beyond anecdotal.
The Chairman has referenced turnover in TSA. Could you
comment a bit about that? What is it and do you think that it
is too high and there are things we could do to try to
ameliorate that?
Mr. Hoggan. Too high is a unique definition. I know the
attrition rate today as well as last year is lower than it was
three, four, five or six years ago.
Mr. Connolly. What is that attrition rate?
Mr. Hoggan. I think a lot of it has to do with the
professionalism we are building. There are full time positions
in the TSA.
Mr. Connolly. What is your annual attrition rate?
Mr. Hoggan. It is through calculation right now. I do not
want to say the exact number because it is being worked but
somewhere between the 12 and 13 range is my understanding how
we finished fiscal year 2013, part-time rates higher than full-
time rates.
Mr. Connolly. Are there things you have learned from that
to try to get that down, to try to improve on retention and
higher job satisfaction? It is not an easy job.
Mr. Hoggan. No, it is not an easy job. As Chairman Mica
said and talked about the average wage, whether in Orlando
Airport or other locations, the transportation security
officers are some of the lowest paid federal employees in the
government. We need to work harder to see what we can do about
salaries.
I think a lot of it has to do with flexibility and
scheduling and opportunities for career advancement, future
development and growth, not only inside the TSA but also inside
the Federal Government.
Mr. Connolly. Mr. Chairman, I do not wish to impose on my
time.
Mr. Mica. Go right ahead. It is just the two of us right
now.
Mr. Connolly. If it is all right with you, I will finish.
Mr. Mica. Yes, go ahead.
Mr. Connolly. Thank you so, much.
Ms. Grover, this may be a logical thing, but I would like
to look at the turnover/retention issue. In terms of best
practices, what do we know that we could do or should do,
including here in Congress, to try to help Mr. Hoggan and his
mission of higher retention and higher job satisfaction for
people in very stressful jobs? Did you look at that all?
I would like to see some comparison and I am sure the
Chairman would also. How does it compare with other federal
agencies? I would assume, given the nature of the stress of the
job, you are actually going to have higher turnover in TSA than
in some other parts of the federal enterprise. I think that is
to be expected.
Are things we could do to make it more satisfying to
improve job satisfaction and lower some of that turnover and
help Mr. Hoggan in terms of retention? Has GAO looked at that,
especially in comparison with either other federal entities or
the private sector?
Ms. Grover. In our work last year on SPP, we were
interested in being able to compare workforce performance
measures for the SPP versus the non-SPP airports. That is
things like attrition and injury rates and so on.
What we found is that TSA has data they collect for all of
the airports that use federal screeners but at the time we did
our work, TSA did not give the contractors specific
instructions about how to define, measure and collect the same
data.
The contractors were providing TSA with information about
attrition but we found that TSA had no assurances that the data
was comparable. We were not able to do a comparison of
attrition at the SPP airports versus the non-SPP airports. One
first step would be to make sure they had comparable attrition
data across all of the airports.
Mr. Connolly. Yes, fair enough. I am also interested in the
broader subject, not just comparing the SPP with non-SPP, but
generally this whole area of screening with say a large
corporate entity. If you are a large corporation with 20,000
employees, what is the expected turnover that you would
absolutely expect, just normal turnover every year?
Corporations do monitor that because that tells them
something about what is going on in the work environment and
what they need to do to retain. It cost a lot more money to
recruit a new employee, train that employee--that is why I
asked Mr. Hoggan about the process. To lose that employee costs
you a lot of money. It is cheaper to retain that employee.
What do we need to do to do that? How does it compare in a
stressful job, not easy, constantly dealing with the public
versus other lines of work--Mr. Hoggan, an acceptable turnover
given the nature of the work, maybe 13 percent a year.
If we find that it is 18 percent then we have a problem. We
all would agree we have a problem because 13 is what we are
expecting. If we are below 13, then we are doing something
right. That tells us something too and we want to do more of
that.
I think we will need you to help us look at other
benchmarks as a management tool so that we can monitor what is
happening in TSA and the SPPs and so can Mr. Hoggan, as a
useful management tool. I commend that to you.
Mr. Bell, have you looked at that at all?
Mr. Bell. That is not something we have looked at.
Mr. Connolly. One of the things the Chairman brought up and
I brought up in my opening statement was there seems to be some
difference in terms of cost estimate methodology. If I
understand TSA correctly, their finding is that SPPs tend to
cost about three to nine percent more than TSA itself.
There are others--I think the Chairman among them--who
would argue that the SPPs actually save money and do not cost
more.
Could you comment on methodology and the discrepancy in
cost estimates, Ms. Grover? I think GAO did look at that?
Ms. Grover. Yes, sir, we did. We looked at TSA's cost
estimating methodology back in 2009 and 2011. When we did our
last report on this, TSA did indeed show a discrepancy of three
percent between the cost of running SPP and non-SPP airports.
However, at the time, we did not have confidence in the
three percent figure because one of the issues that was still
unresolved at that time was the question of uncertainty in the
underlying estimate and underlying assumptions going into the
estimate.
Whenever you build an estimated cost, you have to make a
series of assumptions that underlie it. Ideally what you want
is a range around your point estimate so that policymakers have
a good understanding of the level of confidence in the point
estimate, so the actual difference in cost could have been
three percent but it could have been eight percent or it could
have been negative two percent--in other words that it was
actually less expensive to run airports with private screeners.
Until TSA has a good understanding of the level of
uncertainty feeding into their assumptions and how that plays
out with the range around their point estimate, I think there
is still some question about the relative cost.
Mr. Connolly. This, to me, is a very critical question that
has to be resolved because we cannot deal with different
assumptions about how to get at a cost estimate. We have to
have a methodology we all buy into so that we can then have one
set of numbers, not a competing set of numbers.
Otherwise, how can Congress or the Administration make
informed decisions about which is better in a given
circumstance--going the SPP route or going the TSA route--if we
cannot even agree that it saves or costs money? How can we pass
another bill mandating further privatization on the risk that
we may get it wrong, that the assumption we are making, that
privatization is always good and always saves money, is wrong?
I am a big believer that these decisions have to be made on
a pragmatic basis, not a theological basis. Privatization is
not intrinsically good or bad and neither is federal
employment. It is a matter of what works. Part of what works is
how much does it cost and what is the quality we are getting.
It seems to me this is a very critical question. Again, GAO
can be very helpful in helping us get to the bottom of a
methodology we all buy into.
Mr. Bell, did you want to comment on that?
Mr. Bell. I agree with your comments. We did not go into
testing the cost methodology, similar concerns that GAO had
that we did not have faith in the underlying methodology and
did not have enough information to audit to make a good
conclusion. I know that is something I know TSA is working on.
Our second recommendation is coming up with solid cost
estimates. We are still waiting for that documentation to take
look and see if they have actually done that.
Mr. Connolly. Mr. Hoggan, I assume you would agree with the
principle that we need one methodology we all agree on so we
can have one set of accurate cost estimates to make informed
decisions?
Mr. Hoggan. Absolutely, we do. It is my understanding with
our federal cost estimates, we have taken all the
recommendations from both GAO and the IG and put them inside to
come up with that.
I know there is a large conversation or a difference of
opinion as it relates to imputed cost as relates to additional
employee benefits, whether life insurance or retirement,
corporate tax credit or liability insurance, but those are
costs that TSA is not allocated for and are outside of our
appropriations.
I know the Chairman has expressed concern with that
fundamental difference and I am sure that will come up again.
Not being a finance manager, and with the folks from the
Appropriations staff here, I can only spend money that has been
appropriated to me. That would be outside my appropriations.
Mr. Connolly. I represent the third largest number of
federal employees in the United States in my district and
probably represent the largest number of federal contract
employees in the United States. I deal with this issue all the
time about in-sourcing or out-sourcing. I absolutely insist it
not be done theologically. One is not better than the other. It
is a matter of circumstance and what is the best outcome for
the taxpayer.
Often the private sector will complain that the Federal
Government often does not--you used the term ``fully loaded
costs,'' but sometimes the private sector feels that when the
Federal Government gets in the business of comparing the
private sector to the public sector, it does not hold itself to
the same standard to which it holds the private sector--fully
loaded costs.
Trying to get our arms around this in an accurate way I
think is essential if we are going to make informed decisions
moving forward.
I thank you for your indulgence, Mr. Chairman. The Chairman
talked about maybe what we need to do in contracting for SPP is
get TSA out of the contracting business and give it to GSA. Do
you have any opinion about that, Ms. Grover, from GAO's point
of view?
Ms. Grover. GAO has not done any work specifically
examining that issue, sir. We would be happy in the future to
do a broad review of the current construct of the way that TSA
operations are being run; examine the question of conflict of
interest and whether it exists under the current arrangement;
and what implications that might have for cost or efficiency.
Mr. Connolly. You have looked at TSA's performance as a
contracting agency?
Ms. Grover. Yes, sir.
Mr. Connolly. And?
Ms. Grover. They have a system set up where they meet
monthly with each of their contractors and look at their
performance based on a very broad series of measures. They have
systems in place to follow up in any areas where they see
concerns or discrepancies.
One of the things we pointed out in the past is that at the
time of our review, they were maintaining all of those monthly
records on paper. We encouraged them to consider putting them
into electronic format to allow better contractor oversight
over time.
Mr. Connolly. Mr. Hoggan, my final question, to give you a
chance to comment, is from your point of view, would TSA be
alleviated of the burden if we were to transfer all contracting
responsibility to GSA or would that just complicate your life?
Mr. Hoggan. I believe it would complicate my life. The
acquisitions process we have in TSA, I think we will see going
forward, satisfies the requirements of the SPP office.
Mr. Connolly. Thank you.
Mr. Chairman, again, thank you so much for your indulgence.
Mr. Mica. Thank you, Mr. Ranking Member, too. We got these
figures from TSA. They spent $1.1 billion on administrative
staff and $1.9 billion on their screening staff. I do not know
if that $46,000 or $51,000 is in their 66,000 total.
Mr. Hoggan, how many administrative personnel do you have
in TSA in Washington, D.C.?
Mr. Hoggan. My understanding is we have just under,
headquarters staff and all, about 4,000; 2,500 in headquarters.
Mr. Mica. Just under 4,000--3,986, making $103,000, nothing
because I think people who live in the D.C. area need a good
wage.
Mr. Hoggan. There are 2,500 employees at headquarters
roughly.
Mr. Mica. I helped envision TSA with other members of
Congress. Not in our wildest imagination did we ever think you
would get to 66,000. You are bigger than the United States
Coast Guard and I think six departments of government. You are
at $103,000. If we divided this by half, we get $51,000 to
8,000 screeners, you might get a bit better performance.
They have 9,656 administrators in the field. They are
making $80,000 on average. Again, I want people to have a
living wage. This is not about wages. I think we should keep
them high for retention purposes, whether they are private or
federal.
This is not about union membership and I told you that. San
Francisco had unions, private screening under federal
supervision, long before the all federal. It is not about
getting cheap labor. It is actually paying people. We spent
over $1 billion on training and more than half the people who
were trained have left.
We compared Los Angeles with San Francisco on the training
costs which we got access to and it was $11,000 more per
employee, that is what I was talking about, for federal
screeners compared to the SPP screeners' training.
I am glad to hear you have the integrity training going on.
That is only after meltdowns. I do not want to go through the
sordid history of even my own airport, Orlando, where it was on
national television, the folks ripping off passengers. I am
glad to see you are taking steps on that.
When Mr. Pistole came in I sat with him and he promised me
a risk-based system. How many Americans have had records of
being airline passengers have ever been involved in a terrorist
act?
Mr. Hoggan. How many passengers?
Mr. Mica. How many Americans that have been passengers with
a flying record have ever been involved in a terrorist act?
Mr. Hoggan. I would have to pull the records.
Mr. Mica. There are none. I can give you the list.
Mr. Hoggan. Are you asking U.S. or international?
Mr. Mica. I can give you the people who have been involved
in terrorist acts. Richard Reid is one of the few Anglo names.
He was Jamaican and English. You have had the shoe bomber. We
had the Kenyan. Most of the events start in another country. At
one time we had--it was a classified number--just a handful of
people, looking at people coming into the United States.
However, 99.9 percent of Americans have never caused a problem.
Now we are getting to where you are telling the committee
that we have pre-check for what percentage?
Mr. Hoggan. Approximately 35 percent.
Mr. Mica. It should be 95 or 99 percent. When Mr. Mineta
was Secretary, we set this up. We set up a system where it was
15 minutes from curb to the plane. At the time, the
Administrator was Michael Jackson. I am telling you that is the
way this should operate.
If you come to Orlando or Sanford Airport, what is going on
is almost criminal to American citizens with the way they are
treated. You just heard from the Ranking Member. He does not
fly as much. He just drives across the 14th Street Bridge, but
I fly all the time. I see what we are doing to Americans who
pose no risk.
Now I see finally the mess we have created, the lanes, you
have a clear lane, you have a pre-check lane. It used to be you
go through quickly and now pre-check is almost worse than the
other lanes. They have known crew member lanes. The poor
bastard public is there with their kids.
The other day I saw them patting down a gentleman and if he
posed a risk, dear, God. This is the mess we have created along
with the expensive uniforms, the badges and the intimidation.
We tried to get this shifted to what we intended, private
screening under federal supervision, with the Federal
Government playing the appropriate role, conducting the
intelligence, setting the security standards, changing things
out.
You could go down to Orlando and probably let 90 percent of
the people go through if you had a risk-based system with no
hassle and screen them. Mr. Pistole has failed to put in place
a risk-based system. Now you are telling me you are going to
have 35 percent in pre-check. I can tell you that you are not
ready for it out there.
The other thing I find out talking to the screening people
is they have been the innovators. I know they are the
innovators because I watched the transition. Probably some of
the things I did to help TSA--almost all of the innovations I
took from San Francisco and some of the other models from the
private screeners--but they were allowed to innovate to
actually process people efficiently and effectively. I saw the
results. They performed statistically significantly better.
I know what happens now--this new evaluation, the tip offs
and all of that stuff to tilt the scales. I followed this from
the very beginning but I am telling you that in fact this needs
to be converted out to a risk-based system.
The thing I passed three times in law and we put in the FAA
bill, we tweaked it a little and now they are using it as an
excuse to further delay, it is over ten years to have
identification with a biometric measure, a hard copy and a
pilot, for example.
The TWIC card, they wrote us and said they cannot get a
reader, so we spent $1 billion probably on TWIC cards that you
have to use a driver's license. I do not know where we end
this.
I will tell you what is coming. As you heard here today,
the frustration is bipartisan. How many people do you have in
your SPP office now?
Mr. Hoggan. I have 10 people right now.
Mr. Mica. You may need a whole lot more because I think I
will get the support. I may not get it done this year but I
will get it done within the next year. Mark my words. It took
me a while to get the change in the language which you are now
slow rolling, but I will get the language that within a certain
amount of time, you get out of the screening business, you set
the rules, conduct the audits and so forth. I will get the
support to do it one way or the other. If you cannot handle it,
we will put it in GSA and they will handle it as a contracting
thing.
We also need to get you out of the equipment business. You
cannot maintain, you cannot acquire the acquisition when you
buy the puffers and they have to be destroyed so spend a couple
million dollars. The back scatter equipment staff, I want to do
investigate where we are on that. We spent half a billion on
that. They have been removed.
You deployed the RF Wave, millimeter wave screening which
was never supposed to be used as primary screening, never,
never. You have people up there, little old ladies and people
who pose no risk and you are using that equipment on them and
then patting them down. Come on, guys. It is just unbelievable.
That was another half a billion dollar acquisition--a quarter
of a billion split between a couple. It cost half a billion to
install because they can do it the most expensive way.
I need to even get you out of that business, acquisition of
equipment, acquisition of services because you cannot do it. It
is nothing against you personally. You have been there eight
months.
Mr. Hoggan. I have been in this position as Assistant
Administrator for Security Operations for eight months. I have
been at TSA since November 2004.
Mr. Mica. I am told that the SPP Office is in disarray as
far as its leadership.
Mr. Hoggan. I disagree.
Mr. Mica. I am just told that people who deal with them
cannot get an answer and also movement of personnel.
We have a host of questions, some of them technical in
nature. I want to know what you have done with these
applications, some of them approved back in January 2012 for
your six airports, two approved in June 2012, two in August
2012, one in May 2013 and we still do not have these done after
we passed the law.
The slow rolling is not going to work. I am probably going
to let you stew in your juice a little bit longer but I can
tell you that folks are getting fed up with the whole thing.
There is support for a dramatic redo.
If we could move people after 9/11 through in 15 minutes,
having had that risk at that point, here we are 10 or 12 years
later, and I now aviation is still a target, but we are holding
millions of Americans hostage and they are not getting proper
screening at the most efficient and effective cost.
Take that message back to Mr. Pistole. I will give it to
him personally. I do have more questions and we will submit
them for the record.
Mr. Connolly, is there anything else?
Mr. Connolly. Not at this time, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Mica. Do you notice a little frustration? I get
frustrated sometimes. I think together we can make it work
better. I am embarrassed that I created the thing and now it
has gone awry at great expense and inconvenience.
Security is incredibly important. We still are at risk and
I believe they will use aviation again to come after us, but I
do not think the current structure is geared to deal with that.
Everything we have done is in reaction. Take off your shoes was
the liquids. It is all reactive. Pretty soon we will be going
through there naked and that has to be an ugly sight for some
of us.
Mr. Connolly. That is when I stop flying, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Mica. I thank Mr. Hoggan, Mr. Bell and Ms. Grover for
your work and your cooperation.
There being no further business before the subcommittee,
this hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:38 a.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
APPENDIX
----------
Material Submitted for the Hearing Record
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.031
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.032
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.033
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.034
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.035
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.036
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.037
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.038
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.039
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.040
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T7353.041