[House Hearing, 114 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
REVIEW OF PROGRESS BY THE
DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY (DHS),
SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY DIRECTORATE
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND TECHNOLOGY
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
October 27, 2015
__________
Serial No. 114-45
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via the World Wide Web: http://science.house.gov
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
97-764PDF WASHINGTON : 2017
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Publishing
Office Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512-1800;
DC area (202) 512-1800 Fax: (202) 512-2104 Mail: Stop IDCC,
Washington, DC 20402-0001
COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND TECHNOLOGY
HON. LAMAR S. SMITH, Texas, Chair
FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas
F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., ZOE LOFGREN, California
Wisconsin DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois
DANA ROHRABACHER, California DONNA F. EDWARDS, Maryland
RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas SUZANNE BONAMICI, Oregon
MICHAEL T. McCAUL, Texas ERIC SWALWELL, California
MO BROOKS, Alabama ALAN GRAYSON, Florida
RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois AMI BERA, California
BILL POSEY, Florida ELIZABETH H. ESTY, Connecticut
THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky MARC A. VEASEY, Texas
JIM BRIDENSTINE, Oklahoma KATHERINE M. CLARK, Massachusetts
RANDY K. WEBER, Texas DON S. BEYER, JR., Virginia
BILL JOHNSON, Ohio ED PERLMUTTER, Colorado
JOHN R. MOOLENAAR, Michigan PAUL TONKO, New York
STEVE KNIGHT, California MARK TAKANO, California
BRIAN BABIN, Texas BILL FOSTER, Illinois
BRUCE WESTERMAN, Arkansas
BARBARA COMSTOCK, Virginia
GARY PALMER, Alabama
BARRY LOUDERMILK, Georgia
RALPH LEE ABRAHAM, Louisiana
DARIN LaHOOD, Illinois
C O N T E N T S
October 27, 2015
Page
Witness List..................................................... 2
Hearing Charter.................................................. 3
Opening Statements
Statement by Representative Lamar S. Smith, Chairman, Committee
on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of
Representatives................................................ 8
Written Statement............................................ 9
Statement by Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson, Ranking
Member, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House
of Representatives............................................. 10
Written Statement............................................ 11
Witnesses:
The Honorable Reginald Brothers, Under Secretary for Science and
Technology, Department of Homeland Security
Oral Statement............................................... 12
Written Statement............................................ 15
Discussion....................................................... 27
Appendix I: Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
The Honorable Reginald Brothers, Under Secretary for Science and
Technology, Department of Homeland Security.................... 48
A REVIEW OF PROGRESS BY THE
DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY (DHS),
SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY DIRECTORATE
----------
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 27, 2015
House of Representatives,
Committee on Science, Space, and Technology,
Washington, D.C.
The Committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:05 a.m., in Room
2318 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Lamar Smith
[Chairman of the Committee] presiding.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairman Smith. The Committee on Science, Space, and
Technology will come to order.
Without objection, the Chair is authorized to declare
recesses of the Committee at any time.
Welcome to today's hearing titled ``A Review of Progress by
the Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology
Directorate.''
I'll recognize myself for five minutes and then the Ranking
Member.
Ongoing, productive research and development is crucial to
protect our country and its people. Whether terrorists, cyber
criminals, or drug or people smugglers, our adversaries are
relentless and constantly adjust their tactics. In order to
meet evolving risks and threats, we must continuously invest in
R&D. Just as important, taxpayers' dollars committed to R&D
must have a high return on investment.
Today, the Committee will continue its review of the
Department of Homeland Security's Science and Technology
Directorate and its important work.
In July 2014, the Committee held a hearing on technologies
that would help secure our borders. Then in the following
September, we held a joint subcommittee oversight hearing with
the Homeland Security Committee itself. The two witnesses at
the September hearing were the Director of Homeland Security
and Justice at the Government Accounting Office and the
Department of Homeland Security Under Secretary for Science and
Technology, Dr. Reggie Brothers. The witnesses and our
Committee members focused on a series of GAO reviews that found
serious problems with management and coordination of R&D within
the Department of Homeland Security.
The GAO found the DHS's research and development efforts to
be ``fragmented and overlapping.'' GAO also found hundreds of
millions of dollars spent in previous years on duplicative R&D
projects by other offices within the Department. GAO
recommended that the Science and Technology Directorate develop
stronger policies and guidance to define, oversee, coordinate,
and track R&D across the Department.
America's economy and security are threatened every day by
cyber criminals and hackers. Unfriendly foreign governments
launch regular cyber-attacks to undermine our national security
and steal military and technological secrets. Cyber-attacks
against U.S. government and private sector networks continue to
grow at an alarming rate. But with each new breach of private
and public electronic networks, it's clear the full scope of
the threat we face has yet to be realized.
At a subcommittee hearing last week, members of our
Committee heard about the threat of cyber-attacks to the power
grid. If just one major city were attacked in this way, the
economic and societal consequences would be devastating.
The House Science Committee approved the only cyber
legislation in the last Congress, the Cybersecurity Enhancement
Act of 2014, which was signed into law.
Another area of particular concern is our government's
failure to control our country's borders. Unsecure physical and
virtual borders threaten our national and economic security. A
country that has lost control of its borders has lost control
of its future.
The magnitude of these and other homeland security
challenges require constant advances to our technological
capabilities. For instance, about 12 million containers arrive
in the United States every year, which must be screened by DHS.
More than two million passengers fly domestically every day,
who must be screened by the Transportation Security
Administration. Nearly 100 million international air service
passengers must be screened by Customs and the Border Patrol.
And the annual number of land travelers to the United States
who must be processed by our Border Patrol is approaching 250
million people.
There are not enough agents and screeners available to do
this work. Instead, we must adapt, invent and, when necessary,
create better technological solutions that are smarter, faster,
less expensive, and more effective.
This morning, we will hear from Dr. Brothers on the
progress made in the implementation of the GAO's
recommendations. He also will update us on the S&T
Directorate's initiatives to help DHS component agencies meet
the full spectrum of threats.
[The prepared statement of Chairman Smith follows:]
Prepared Statement of Committee Chairman Lamar S. Smith
Ongoing, productive research and development (R&D) is crucial to
protect our country and its people. Whether terrorists, cyber
criminals, or drug or people smugglers, our adversaries are relentless
and constantly adjust their tactics.
In order to meet evolving risks and threats, we must continuously
invest in R&D. Just as important, taxpayers' dollars committed to R&D
must have a high return on investment.
Today, the Committee will continue its review of the Department of
Homeland Security's Science and Technology Directorate and its
important work. In July 2014, the Committee held a hearing on
technologies that would help secure our borders. Then in September, we
held a joint subcommittee oversight hearing with the Homeland Security
Committee.
The two witnesses at the September hearing were the Director of
Homeland Security and Justice at the Government Accountability Office
(GAO) and the Department of Homeland Security Undersecretary for
Science and Technology, Dr. Reggie Brothers. The witnesses and our
Committee members focused on a series of GAO reviews that found serious
problems with management and coordination of R&D within the Department
of Homeland Security (DHS).
The GAO found the DHS's research and development efforts to be
``fragmented and overlapping.'' GAO also found hundreds of millions of
dollars spent in previous years on duplicative R&D projects by other
offices within the Department. GAO recommended that the Science and
Technology Directorate develop stronger policies and guidance to
define, oversee, coordinate and track R&D across the Department.
America's economy and security are threatened every day by cyber
criminals and hackers. Unfriendly foreign governments launch regular
cyber-attacks to undermine our national security and steal military and
technological secrets.
Cyber-attacks against U.S. government and private sector networks
continue to grow at an alarming rate. But with each new breach of
private and public electronic networks, it's clear the full scope of
the threat we face has yet to be realized.
At a subcommittee hearing last week, members of our Committee heard
about the threat of cyber-attacks to the power grid. If just one major
city were attacked in this way, the economic and societal consequences
would be devastating.
The House Science Committee approved the only cyber legislation in
the last Congress, the Cybersecurity Enhancement Act of 2014, which was
signed into law.Another area of particular concern is our government's
failure to control our country's borders.
Unsecure physical and virtual borders threaten our national and
economic security. A country that has lost control of its border has
lost control of its future. The magnitude of these and other homeland
security challenges require constant advances to our technological
capabilities. For instance:
About 12 million containers arrive in the US every year
which must be screened by DHS;
More than two million passengers fly domestically every
day who must be screened by the Transportation Security Administration;
Nearly 100 million international air service passengers
must be screened by Customs and the Border Patrol; and
The annual number of land travelers to the United States
who must be processed by our Border Patrol is approaching 250 million.
There are not enough agents and screeners available to do this
work. Instead, we must adapt, invent and, when necessary, create better
technological solutions that are smarter, faster, less expensive, and
more effective.
This morning, we will hear from Dr. Brothers on the progress made
in the implementation of the GAO's recommendations. He also will update
us on the S&T Directorate's initiatives to help DHS component agencies
meet the full spectrum of threats.
Chairman Smith. That concludes my opening statement, and
the Ranking Member, Mrs. Eddie Bernice Johnson, the gentlewoman
from Texas, is recognized for her opening statement.
Ms. Johnson. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I am pleased to welcome Under Secretary Brothers back to
the Committee. The last time you testified with us, you only
had been in the job 5 months. I look forward to hearing your
testimony about the changes you've implemented in the last
year, and your thoughts on what this Committee can do in
reauthorization to support your efforts in strengthening the
security and resiliency of the United States through science
and technology.
We've previously heard testimony about GAO's 2012
recommendation that DHS develop policies and guidance for
defining, overseeing, coordinating, and tracking R&D activities
across the department, and that S&T establish time frames and
milestones for collecting and evaluating feedback from its
customers. We have also heard criticism of test and evaluation
procedures, the quality of external input, relationship with
the operational components of DHS and other customers, and
employees' morale.
Under Dr. Brothers' leadership, the S&T Directorate has
defined R&D, published a strategic plan, undertaken a major
overhaul of the S&T Advisory Committee, and developed several
program and management initiatives to strengthen the work of
the S&T Directorate and make it a more effective partner for
DHS.
While I'm sure it was not easy, Dr. Brothers, you may look
back at the development of the strategic plan as being the easy
part of the job. Now you need to implement and institutionalize
your vision.
As you know, you are not the first Under Secretary to
inherit an extremely challenged S&T Directorate, nor the first
to undertake major reforms in an effort to right the ship. The
constant change with every new leader has surely contributed to
the challenges facing the S&T Directorate, as well as to very
low employee morale.
In your written testimony, you spelled out five priorities
for your tenure as Under Secretary. I'd like to hear from you
what you hope S&T will look like when it comes time to hand it
over to your successor.
This is meant to be a legislative hearing, so I hope that
some of the discussion today will help guide our thinking about
reauthorization of the S&T Directorate. The Committee on
Homeland Security has already reported out a bipartisan
reauthorization bill. That bill does a good job of addressing
many of the challenges that have been identified over time. As
I understand it, the Department provided significant technical
assistance in the drafting of that bill, and some of the
Department's own priorities for reauthorization are reflected.
If there are any remaining concerns or requests for
reauthorization provisions, now is the time for Members of this
Committee to hear directly from the Under Secretary.
I hope, Dr. Brothers, that you--that we can be a partner
with you and unintentionally--not unintentionally place any
obstacles in your way as you work hard to build a better and
more effective S&T Directorate.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back the balance of my
time.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Johnson follows:]
Prepared Statement of Committee Ranking Member
Eddie Bernice Johnson
Thank you Mr. Chairman. I am pleased to welcome Under Secretary
Brothers back to the Committee. The last time you testified for us, you
had only been in the job for 5 months. I look forward to hearing your
testimony about the changes you've implemented in the last year, and
your thoughts on what this Committee can do in a reauthorization bill
to support your efforts to strengthen the security and resiliency of
the United States through science and technology.
We've previously heard testimony about GAO's 2012 recommendation
that ``DHS develop policies and guidance for defining, overseeing,
coordinating, and tracking R&D activities across the department, and
that S&T establish time frames and milestones for collecting and
evaluating feedback from its customers.'' We have also heard criticism
of test and evaluation procedures, the quality of external input,
relationship with the operational components of DHS and other
customers, and employee morale. Under Dr. Brothers' leadership, the S&T
Directorate has defined R&D, published a strategic plan, undertaken a
major overhaul of the S&T Advisory Committee, and developed several
program and management initiatives to strengthen the work of the S&T
Directorate and make it a more effective partner to the rest of DHS.
While I'm sure it was not easy, Dr. Brothers, you may look back at
the development of the strategic plan as being the easy part of the
job. Now you need to implement and institutionalize your vision. As you
know, you are not the first Under Secretary to inherit an extremely
challenged S&T Directorate, nor the first to undertake major reforms in
an effort to right the ship. The constant change with every new leader
has surely contributed to the challenges facing the S&T Directorate, as
well as to very low employee morale. In your written testimony you
spelled out five priorities for your tenure as Under Secretary. I'd
like to hear from you what you hope S&T will look like when it comes
time to hand it over to your successor.
This is meant to be a legislative hearing, so I hope that some of
the discussion today will help guide our thinking about a
reauthorization of the S&T Directorate. The Committee on Homeland
Security has already reported out a bipartisan reauthorization bill.
That bill does a good job of addressing many of the challenges that
have been identified over time. As I understand it, the Department
provided significant technical assistance in the drafting of that bill,
and some of the Department's own priorities for reauthorization are
reflected. If there are any remaining concerns or requests for
reauthorization provisions, now is the time for Members of this
Committee to hear directly from the Under Secretary. I hope, Dr.
Brothers, that we can be a partner with you and not unintentionally
place any obstacles in your way as you work hard to build a better and
more effective S&T Directorate.
Again, thank you Mr. Chairman for holding this hearing and I yield
back the balance of my time.
Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mrs. Johnson.
And I'll introduce our witness. Our witness today is Dr.
Reggie Brothers, the Under Secretary for Science and Technology
at the Department of Homeland Security. In this position, Dr.
Brothers serves as the Science Advisor to DHS Secretary Jeh
Johnson and is responsible for DHS research and development.
Before his Senate confirmation in April 2014, Dr. Brothers
was Director of Mission Applications at BAE Systems. He also
has served as the Defense Department's Deputy Assistant
Secretary of Defense for Research and as a Program Manager at
DOD's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA.
Dr. Brothers earned his bachelor's degree in electrical
engineering from Tufts University, his master's in electrical
engineering from Southern Methodist University, and his Ph.D.
in electrical engineering and computer science from MIT.
Dr. Brothers, we welcome you and look forward to your
testimony.
TESTIMONY OF HON. REGINALD BROTHERS,
UNDER SECRETARY, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY,
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY
Dr. Brothers. Thank you, and good morning.
Chairman Smith, Ranking Member Johnson, and distinguished
Members of the Committee, good morning, and thank you for this
opportunity to discuss the role the Department of Homeland
Security Science and Technology Directorate, or S&T. I'm
grateful for the Committee's longstanding interest and support
for the Directorate and the Department.
A year and a half ago, I joined the Department with five
priorities for the Directorate: develop visionary goals,
produce an actionable strategy, foster an empowered workforce,
deliver force-multiplying solutions, and energize a Homeland
Security Industrial Base. These were based on feedback from S&T
staff, from inside the Department, and from outside
stakeholders including Congress. I'm proud to say that as an
organization we've enjoyed remarkable success in each of these
five areas. I believe S&T is emerging as a federal R&D
organization tailor-made for today's fast-changing homeland
threats.
To begin with, last year we published Visionary Goals for
S&T with an updated S&T Strategic Plan. The plan includes
technology roadmaps for each of our major R&D investment areas,
and we don't anticipate this being once every four years type
of product. We've already updated once, and we're looking at
interactive web-based capability moving forward. This is a tool
not only to focus our internal energy and resources but to
engage people and industry and organizations outside S&T to
ensure progress towards common Homeland Security goals.
We reduced the overall number of programs to make room for
fewer, more impactful projects, and reprioritized our funding
around the most pressing national, departmental and
Congressional priorities. Reprioritization allowed S&T to put
resources towards urgent areas of need such as unmanned aerial
systems and to invest in ambitious new apex projects to tackle
future challenges in areas like aviation screening and border
situational awareness.
In reshaping our R&D portfolio, we also recognize technical
requirements and core competencies in areas like data
analytics, identity management that are common across numerous
projects regardless of specific subject areas. As a result, to
avoid reinventing the wheel with each new project, our
portfolio includes a new category of projects called engines
that help us realize efficiencies compared to previous S&T
approaches. These projects represent a novel approach in S&T
and benefit from the diverse, broad-ranging expertise within
the Directorate. As today's innovational research becomes
increasingly interdisciplinary, the value of an engine for
promoting efficient collaboration and cross-pollenization
within the Directorate only increases.
We've taken numerous steps to empower the workforce,
incentivize collaboration in the organization, and boost
morale. I'm proud to say that initiatives like S&T's new
employee council, a concerted effort to better connect
leadership and staff, is beginning to be reflected in S&T's
Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey scores. In the most recent
survey, we saw significant gains of 10 points or higher on
questions related to workforce recognition--workplace
recognition, leadership, and innovation. I'm encouraged to see
the Directorate working together and rallying around each other
but I know our work isn't complete. We'll continue building on
our positive momentum.
Some of the most beneficial changes at S&T involve how we
partner with components, draw the requirements for our
projects, and coordinate R&D across the Department. In an
austere fiscal environment, and at the same time, a time of
increasing threats, we must be strategic about our R&D work and
how we prioritize our investments to make the largest impact in
securing our country.
By emphasizing cross-cutting solutions with greater reach
in the most pressing Homeland Security challenge areas, we
avoid being overly internally driven or too focused on highly
specific end-user requests.
As part of the Secretary's Unity of Effort initiative, S&T
has relaunched departmental Integrated Product Teams as a
formal mechanism for identifying technology capability gaps
across the Department's mission areas. Though the Secretary
only approved S&T's approach in August, we have already
chartered and convened two of the five initial IPTs with two
more expected by the end of this month. The IPTs are boosted by
S&T initiatives like the Innovation Centers and the Pioneer
program that embed S&T staff directly with components, and
that'll facilitate better connection and better understanding
of operational environments, tactics, techniques, and
procedures.
Finally, perhaps most importantly, S&T is making great
strides in broadening the community of problem solvers and
technologists that make up the Homeland Security industrial
base. We launched prize competitions and accelerators to
connect with startups and small businesses who may never have
considered government as a partner. Our pilot effort for
Homeland Security focus accelerators was particularly
successful in demonstrating not only startup community
interests in participating but also our ability to successfully
spur products and companies to attract private investment and
simultaneously meet the needs of Homeland Security operators.
In the last year, we also opened three new university-based
Centers of Excellence. We broke ground on construction for the
cutting-edge Bio and Agro-Defense Facility. We expanded with
our international partners including innovative public-private
partnership with Israel. We've established a presence in
Silicon Valley to expand our day-to-day, face-to-face contact
with major innovations hubs outside the beltway. If we succeed
with our expanded Silicon Valley presence, we look forward to
using a similar outreach model in Los Angeles, Austin, Dallas,
Chicago, Boston, and other hubs around the country.
We're clearly trying a lot of new things at S&T. I've asked
the directorate to be experimental, to try new things and think
differently about processes. When it doesn't work, we scrap it.
When it does, we expand it. As more of these experiments work,
we are expecting to reap the benefits inside the Directorate,
across the Department and with a growing group of stakeholders.
I look forward to your questions. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Brothers follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairman Smith. Thank you, Dr. Brothers, and I'll recognize
myself for questions.
My first question is a lookback earlier this year at the
perhaps as many 25 million federal employees who had their
computers hacked. Almost all of them had applied for security
clearances, so this was sensitive information that presumably
was accessed.
What are you all doing to prevent another such cyber-attack
on federal employees?
Dr. Brothers. That's a good question, sir. We have a robust
cyber strategy, cyber research and development strategy. We
look at how can we protect infrastructure. We look at a variety
of different technologies and techniques to secure this
infrastructure. We work----
Chairman Smith. What tangible steps, though, have you all
taken to try to prevent this from occurring again, not just
strategies, but what have you actually implemented?
Dr. Brothers. I understand. I understand, sir. So I can go
back to--so right now, because of--right now we're working with
NPPD. We are working with the Secret Service. We're working
with the stakeholders to actually understand their systems, to
understand where we can actually make some improvements. So I
can say based on--we have some cyber technologies, some
enhancements that I can talk about that we've done in the past.
Regarding your current question, I can look to the types of
things we're doing. We are doing research and cybersecurity
research for the infrastructure. We're looking at software
assurance. For example, when folks make--when software
designers develop software, we've developed a research
credibility so they can more--so they're able to actually
determine whether or not their software is valid or not, and
whether it has coding problems.
Chairman Smith. Is it fair to summarize what you're saying
by noting that you're still studying the problem as opposed to
having taken any specific preventative measures?
Dr. Brothers. So we have continuously since 2003 or so been
working in cyberspace, and we have had a number of successes
over the time. We've had something like 35 successful
transitions of cyber technology into industry and into our
stakeholders. The particular problems that you're talking about
now working with government, we have been working, but we are
now working to develop an enhanced strategy given some of the
newer technologies.
Chairman Smith. Well, it does sound like you haven't taken
any specific, tangible steps. When you do, would you let us
know?
Dr. Brothers. Absolutely.
Chairman Smith. And I hope it's sooner rather than later.
It seems like by now there would have been some tangible steps
taken.
Dr. Brothers. I think--I'll be glad to come back with a
classified briefing on the work we're doing.
Chairman Smith. That's a fair response. Thank you.
Next question is this, and this is something that I've been
thinking about for a long time, and I think I'm grateful that
it hasn't occurred yet, but what specifically is Homeland
Security doing to prevent, say, a terrorist, would-be
terrorist, from flying a small drone over a packed stadium of
60,000 people perhaps watching a pro football game and having
this drone release anthrax and killing most of the people who
are present? What are we doing to prevent that kind of physical
attack?
Dr. Brothers. So your first question involves technology
that, as you know, is rapidly changing. So the threats are
changing with respect to cyber, with respect to the small
drones, and the technology capabilities are changing rapidly as
well.
In order to address those, we are doing a lot to understand
what the capabilities are, what the potential threats are. We
have taken the lead in the interagency to look at the whole
community response because there are a number of interrelated
issues here with the drone problem. One is, how does a
community actually respond, how do first responders respond.
The other issue is, what technologies can we use to effectively
detect, track, classify----
Chairman Smith. I assume DHS is working with the FAA on
various rules that would govern the flights of----
Dr. Brothers. We are absolutely working with the FAA. We've
got briefings with the entire Department of Transportation. The
Secretary has convened a meeting of stakeholders across the
government to discuss this issue. I think it's safe to say that
we have already done a data call across the interagency to look
at what capabilities not only do we have but the Department of
Defense and others have to mitigate this threat, and we are
moving forward with both these areas of, how does the whole
community with respect to policy procedures and how to respond
with technology.
Chairman Smith. And that may be a subject of a classified
hearing or discussion as well.
Dr. Brothers. Absolutely.
Chairman Smith. Last question is this. We have something on
the order of 250,000 criminal immigrants at large in the United
States. Clearly, these individuals are not supposed to be here,
and just as clearly, they will commit many more crimes while
they are present in the United States. A significant fraction
will go on to be re-arrested. What is your S&T Directorate
doing to assure real-time identification of illegal immigrants
while they are still in custody?
Dr. Brothers. We have a three-prong strategy in our Borders
and Maritime Division. The strategy includes securing the land,
maritime borders as well as cargo security. If I can talk about
one of our programs when we look at land crossings, we're
actually trying to combine information that can be shared by
federal, state and local first responders. We're also
developing----
Chairman Smith. But I'm talking about criminal aliens,
criminal immigrants who are actually in custody, and the
identification problem we have with them. Do you have any
progress reports on that?
Dr. Brothers. I, sir, do not have progress reports on that.
Again, as a science advisor, we are dealing mostly with how we
protect and secure the borders, not necessarily some of the
issues that you're dealing with.
Chairman Smith. Okay. Thank you, Dr. Brothers. I appreciate
it.
And the gentlewoman from Texas is recognized for her
questions.
Ms. Johnson. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Under Secretary, you're not the first Under Secretary
to completely reorganize the Directorate in an effort to make
things work better. What steps are you taking to try to
institutionalize your reforms or at least those that show early
success?
Dr. Brothers. Thank you for the question. Let me--if you
don't mind, let me talk about some of those areas.
I think one of the challenges that I saw coming into the
Department was how do we prioritize what do we do with respect
to our investments because if you look at the QHSR, Quadrennial
Homeland Security Review, for example, there's a tremendously
broad set of challenges that we face, but yet we have a--we're
resource-limited like all organizations. As such, the question
becomes, what do--we should--how do we prioritize these
investments. We've looked at then this Integrated Product Team
that I mentioned in my opening statements. These teams are
cross-departmental teams. They're made up of actually
operational component leads. They're chaired by the component
leads, and their charter, if you will, is to develop capability
gaps the Department has in terms of what we can do. I think the
chairman mentioned the challenge that we have on the border
with respect to, they can't necessarily be solved just with
more people, and this is where we really do expect to make a--
we do plan to make a difference. So we have set up a set of
five different Integrated Product Teams that are new.
Getting to your point, how do we make sure this doesn't go
away, we put--the Secretary signed a memo instituting these
Integrated Product Teams. Part of that memo had to do with how
we impact acquisition as well. So one of the comments earlier
that I think you made, ma'am, was on test and evaluation, and
one of the challenges that major acquisition programs have is
that they tend to fail if you only do rigorous test and
evaluation from rejected source at the endpoint, at operational
test and evaluation point, you may not catch some of the issues
in the beginning. So what we're doing now is, we're going in
the early part for developmental test and engineering. So
that's another area that we're looking for codification of what
we're trying to do as well as the work that we're doing in
system engineering at the front end of the acquisition work.
So I think what some of the changes I've made and I made a
point when I first came into the office was to say form follows
function. My goal wasn't to do some kind of overall very
disruptive type of reorganization, just for the sake of
reorganization, but to really look at what do we need to do to
be more effective and impactful organization. And I think the
ability to reprioritize--not--but the ability to properly
prioritize, the ability to track R&D because, as you may know,
the Secretary has also signed out a list of R&D criteria. So
how do we actually determine what R&D is within the Department
compared to what our investments are? That will help us--
getting to your point about the GAO report, that will help us
actually define what R&D spends across the Department. Then
using the IPT process, we're able to prioritize what kind of
research and development we're doing.
Ms. Johnson. The Homeland Security Science and Technology
Advisory Committee, or HSSTAC, has some concerns of feeling
underutilized. Have you attempted to include them?
Dr. Brothers. Again, thank you for the question. Yes, we
have. So what I've taken, I've taken the model from the size of
the Defense Science Board, quite frankly, has been trying to
reinvigorate the committee. I realize that our problems aren't
just only science and technical based in the Department--the
Directorate. What we really need is strategy and management
help as well.
So what I've asked for is to increase the number of members
of that Science and Technology Board so that part of that
board, half the board, roughly, will be science technologists.
The other half roughly will be folks from management and
strategic and strategy communities. The sense--you know, my
goal is to have a diverse set of thought leaders to help us in
all these areas that we face across the Directorate.
Ms. Johnson. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mrs. Johnson.
The gentleman from Illinois, Mr. Hultgren, is recognized
for his questions.
Mr. Hultgren. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, Dr. Brothers. Good to see you again. I
appreciate your work, and I'm glad you're here with us today.
Dr. Brothers. Thank you.
Mr. Hultgren. I can say that we all do appreciate the
opportunity to be able to hear about ways that we can help the
Department of Homeland Security better align its Science and
Technology Directorates certainly to better serve our dedicated
Homeland Security professionals but ultimately to keep our
constituents safe.
I see technology as a force multiplier that can keep our
Homeland Security professionals safe by avoiding unnecessary
danger while also giving them a reach that if we do our job is
unmatched by our adversaries.
I also applaud your goals of energizing a Homeland Security
industrial base and producing an actionable strategy based on
visionary goals.
The last time you were here before us, I asked you a number
of questions on our technology transfer capabilities and the
disconnect that sometimes exists between our end-users and
those who are charged with developing new technologies. At our
previous hearings with Mr. Mower regarding your Directorate, I
discussed how DHS is utilizing our other assets outside of your
agency.
Today I'd like to ask some questions about how DHS is best
utilizing and perhaps investing in the numerous federal
research assets we have available to meet your goals. To me,
this is really about deriving a maximum efficiency from our
taxpayer dollars. It's my understanding that DHS primarily
interacts with DOE through a modified work for others process,
or WFO process. Is this still a satisfactory process, and are
there other forms of agreement such as the cooperative research
and development agreement, or CRADAs, or agreements to
commercialize technology which may better serve your agency
while emerging your industrial base?
Dr. Brothers. I think that we have a very strong
relationship with the DOE laboratories. I think that because of
the way the relationship between us is structured, I think
we're able to leverage that relationship effectively and
efficiently.
You brought up other issues including how do we reach out
to industry, and you brought up CRADAs. I think CRADAs is a way
that we can talk to industrial partners effectively. I think
OTA--other transaction authority--is also an effective way that
we can actually deal with our industrial partners in this as
well.
Mr. Hultgren. So you think there are some opportunities to
use some of these other forms and that just sticking with the
work for others, modified work for others process maybe isn't
sufficient, that there needs to be some other things as well.
Dr. Brothers. I think that we have a number of potential
vehicles at our disposal. I think a challenge is determining
where they're best used and using them as such. I think
sometimes we don't necessarily use all of them as effectively
as we could, and I've been pushing to do that. I can mention
the OTAs as well as the Prize Challenge Authority.
Mr. Hultgren. Let me move on. In your written testimony,
you highlighted your need to screen cargo with a minimal impact
to the pace of travel and speed of commerce. I wondered how
familiar your agency is with the capabilities at the DOE
National Labs. In particularly, DHS works extensively with a
few of the larger multipurpose labs but it is familiar with the
equally important and unique capabilities that reside at
single-purpose labs. One I have special interest in is
Fermilab, which is a leader in accelerator technologies that I
believe could be applied for these cargo screening missions.
How familiar is the lab with these unique and individually
focused labs?
Dr. Brothers. So I can't speak to all of our leadership. I
do know that we have had many visits to all the laboratories. I
know that in our Transportation Security Laboratory, for
example, that we are demonstrating prototypes of screening
technology from the DOE laboratories, so we make a point of
actually going to laboratories, understanding what they have.
For example, our Director of HSARP is taking a tour through DOE
laboratories. This is important because one of the major things
that we can do as an organization is to understand what the
state of art is across what I like to call the S&T ecosystem.
That ecosystem is our laboratories, our industry, et cetera.
And so that is a charge I've given to our leadership and it was
taken very seriously and very passionately.
Mr. Hultgren. And I would hope you look again at these
unique labs, as I mentioned, Fermilab. I think there could be
some real synergy there that would make some sense. I wonder,
would DHS be willing to invest in infrastructure at the
national labs, whether lab space or specialized equipment, to
advance the Homeland Security mission. DOE or other national
labs cannot always afford to maintain the types of capabilities
needed for a broad variety of national security missions.
Dr. Brothers. I think we're always interested and
determined to give the best technical solutions to our
stakeholders, and we do what is needed to make that happen,
whether it's investing in grants for universities or contracts
for laboratories, what have you.
Mr. Hultgren. I do think the labs are a perfect spot. I
talk about the ecosystem of science as well. But it might take
some investments, you know, certainly on the infrastructure
side of things, but I think the payoff could be huge again for
those that we're called to serve.
My time is expired. I yield back, Chairman. Thank you.
Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Hultgren.
The gentleman from Virginia, Mr. Beyer, is recognized for
his questions.
Mr. Beyer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Dr. Brothers, thank you for being with us.
Dr. Brothers. Thank you.
Mr. Beyer. I've always felt that one of the most important
jobs of the leader is to create a culture where workers are
happy, motivated, filled with passion for the mission, and yet
poor Homeland Security tends to rank last in the federal
employee viewpoint. But you've taken the step----[audio lost
for 3 minutes and 12 seconds].
Dr. Brothers. I have to have flex capacity, so as such,
from a research perspective, we develop these Integrated
Product Teams but we've also developed a set of priorities
based on Presidential priorities, Congressional priorities,
Secretarial priorities and some of my own priorities that go
into the same mix of how we prioritize all these things.
So for example, the Chairman mentioned UAVs, small drones.
That's part of the Secretary's priorities. Countervailing
extremism is another one of those as part of the Secretary's
priorities.
So the way this all works is we have these Integrated
Product Teams across the areas--aviation security,
cybersecurity, border security, counterterrorism and
biosecurity. I might say we also have work on our first
responders as well. That information--they come up with
capability gaps working with the components heads. That
information is flowed up to what we call the senior research
council chaired by my deputy. That senior research council then
prioritizes all of those lists. To that are added these pop-up
things that we were talking about because, again, I've got to
have flex capacity to deal with some of these pop-ups that we
didn't anticipate, so-called black swan events. So that's how
we're actually prioritizing these kinds of things.
Mr. Beyer. Okay. Quickly, you're the fourth Under Secretary
for S&T. You've reorganized. I love your five Visionary Goals.
But from a Congressional perspective, it looks like every time
we get a new Under Secretary, everything gets reorganized and
new goals. Should we institutionalize this Congressionally, or
how do you give us some sense of stability and long-term
action?
Dr. Brothers. So I think there's always this tradeoff
between how much do you codify versus how much flexibility do
you give an incoming Under Secretary. My goal was not to do a
tremendous reorganization. In fact, it's not so much--I've
actually maybe pointed in what I consider a more focused way.
I've tried to actually align our resources towards these
Visionary Goals with a five-year strategy and with given
realistic prioritization based on the IPTs.
I think it's important that we move--we continue to have
IPTs, that we continue S&T's involvement in the acquisition
process in the front end, not just the back end. I think these
things are important. I think in terms of specific areas, the
specific ways the organization is structured, because of the
fluid nature of the threat, and we discussed cyber, we
discussed UAVs because the fluid nature of the threat, I would
hate to hamstring the next Under Secretary's hands by being
overly prescriptive in the actual structure of S&T, but there's
certain aspects of it, like I said, IPTs, the importance of us
being involved in the front end of acquisition that I think are
really important to be ongoing.
Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Beyer.
The gentleman from Alabama, Mr. Palmer, is recognized.
Mr. Palmer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Dr.
Brothers, for being here this morning.
I want to ask you about an audit from the Office of
Inspector General regarding a contract with NVS dealing with
technology that the Chairman mentioned in regard to a
biothreat. According to OIG, S&T may have wasted $23 million
without getting adequate deliverables. One of the things that
the OIG report found was that you had a lot of employee
turnover in the program management. Is that an issue?
Dr. Brothers. So right now I don't see that as being an
issue. I think that we have new controls that we put on that
the report recommended that we take three types of actions.
Mr. Palmer. Right.
Dr. Brothers. We've taken those actions. We're developing a
program tracking. We've improved our program management guide.
So I think that we have responded to the GAO in kind. I would
mention, though, that this program was stopped after four
years, and while the way it was stopped may not have been
optimal, which is we actually went to the IG ourselves,
technology changes over four years, and I mentioned earlier how
quickly technology changes. There's another case of rapid
technology change in the capability of industry as well.
Mr. Palmer. I think in your response to OIG, you said that
there's still a need for this technology. Is that being pursued
through other contracts?
Dr. Brothers. Quite honestly, because it's ongoing
litigation, I can't get into a lot of details of this right
now.
Mr. Palmer. Okay. I have a couple other questions too for
you, Dr. Brothers.
The President's budget requests a substantial cut to S&T
Directorate's budget compared to fiscal year 2015. How do you
account for this?
Dr. Brothers. I'm sorry. Could you repeat the question,
please?
Mr. Palmer. The President's budget requests a substantial
cut to the S&T Directorate budget compared to fiscal year 2015,
and I'm just asking, how do you respond to that reduction?
Dr. Brothers. We support the President's budget. I think
this is something that we have to deal with within our
capabilities. This gets back to how we prioritize the type of
investments we have and why we can't respond to all threats
across the entire domain of impact versus probability of
occurrence.
Mr. Palmer. And then my last question is, a 2012 report by
the GAO recommended that S&T develop policies and guidance for
reporting R&D activities across the Department, nothing that
DHS didn't even know the total amount being spent on R&D at
DHS. Has Science and Technology developed these policies?
Dr. Brothers. So yes, and so that's what I was mentioning
earlier, that part of the problem we had when that report came
out was, there wasn't a definition of R&D. So when folks were
reporting the R&D, they didn't necessarily have the same
guidelines for what R&D was. The Secretary has signed a
definition of research and development, which is--which goes
along with what the Department of Defense and NASA has as well,
and now we're working on a directive to do a data call based on
those--based on that criteria.
Mr. Palmer. And lastly, so are you confident that S&T has a
clear idea of all the research and development that's being
done at DHS?
Dr. Brothers. I'm confident that we now have the structures
to figure that out.
Mr. Palmer. Are you looking at overlaps, duplications?
Dr. Brothers. We are. So we're going to start having annual
reviews. When I was at the Department of Defense, I was part of
a team that set up annual reviews of the Service's research and
development budgets across the Department. That is something
that we will be doing in DHS as well.
Mr. Palmer. Well, obviously we need metrics to show how
effective S&T has been. So how would you recommend Congress
measure return on the investments in regard to appropriations
to S&T?
Dr. Brothers. So we have a portfolio review process. That
portfolio review process has a variety of metrics in it. I'd be
happy to come and brief you on that process.
Mr. Palmer. Thank you very much.
I yield the balance of time, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Palmer.
The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Weber, is recognized.
Mr. Weber. Thank you, Chairman, and thank you, Dr.
Brothers.
In your discussion with Congressman Palmer, you talked
about employee turnover. How many employees is in your
organization?
Dr. Brothers. We have, I think, on the order of 400
civilian federal workers.
Mr. Weber. Four hundred?
Dr. Brothers. It's on that order.
Mr. Weber. And you talked about turnover, and you said you
didn't see it as an issue, and you've been there since 2014. Is
that right?
Dr. Brothers. 2013.
Mr. Weber. 2013. Okay. What was the rate of turnover before
you got there? Are you able to look at those two comparison
numbers?
Dr. Brothers. I can. I don't have the numbers off the top
of my head. I'll be glad to get them back to you, though.
Mr. Weber. Okay. So have you taken a look at what they were
historically before you got there than what you got there and
compared those to other agencies?
Dr. Brothers. I don't have the--we have. I don't have those
numbers. I do know that since I've been there, the turnover has
dropped. We can get to you those numbers, though.
Mr. Weber. Either that's a good thing or you've made it a
lot easier on them. I'm not sure, so----
And do you categorize--in your--well, let me do it this
way. The mission statement says that you all's mission is to
improve Homeland Security by working with partners to provide
state-of-the-art technology and solutions that help them to
achieve their missions, quote, unquote. Have you taken a look
at that statement and decided in your matrix a measurable
matrix to, number one, improve, number two, who all your
partners are, number three, what is state-of-the-art technology
and solutions, number four, what are their missions, and number
five, what it doesn't say is, do you have a way to measure your
success in those four areas?
Dr. Brothers. So I think from my time in industry, from my
time in Department of Defense and here, there's always of a
challenge for research and development to quantify a return on
investment. That said, I understand the need for the Committee
to understand what kind of metrics we can have for success. I
do understand that.
I think that we have done a--now with the processes that I
talked about with respect to these IPTs, we will have agreed-
upon priorities across the Department. We will be developing a
research and development plan that was signed out by the
Secretary. So the Department will agree on a research and
development plan. Then the question is, how do we actually
achieve that--achieve those solutions. So I think that then you
start measuring our success based on how we start closing those
gaps that will determine the capabilities from the IPTs.
Mr. Weber. You mentioned, talking about the IPTs, and I
forgot who it was in dialog with, that there were four
priorities. You call them Presidential, Congressional,
Secretary, and then your own. Would you take those four mission
statements, again, improving Homeland Security, helping your
partners, state-of-the-art technology, and their missions--are
you able to integrate those into the four? I mean, because
those are four priorities that actually in those four areas,
there would be some overlap. Some things would happen in the
Presidential realm that wouldn't happen in the Congressional
realm and vice versa.
Dr. Brothers. That's absolutely true.
Mr. Weber. How do you make those priorities?
Dr. Brothers. So these are--so those priorities are really
made in discussions and conversations with leadership.
Mr. Weber. Do you have a team that's designated to
Congressional priorities and a team that's designated to
President and Secretarial and then your own, to use your words?
Dr. Brothers. So I can't say there's a team right now. This
is a work in progress. We just started this based on input that
we've gotten from our working with staff members, with Hill
members. I'm trying to understand what Congressional priorities
are as well as working directly with the Secretary but we're
working on formalizing this process. A question came up
earlier, how--you know, how do we codify these things. This is
one of the things again that has to be more formal.
Mr. Weber. What do you see as Homeland Security threats?
And I've just listed a few--drugs. I mean, you talk about
drones, terrorists, weapons of mass destruction. Do you
categorize and prioritize those threats?
Dr. Brothers. So the--yes and yes. The IPTs are where
you're categorizing the threats based on QHSR, again, aviation
security, border security, these kinds of things, and then
those threats, based on capability gaps, are prioritized
through the IPT process and they're prioritized through
discussions in partnership with our operational components.
Mr. Weber. Okay. Well, obviously, we wish you all the
success and we want to, you know, make sure that you get your
job done. Is is there a mechanism in place where in the process
of achieving that success you can share that with states,
especially and particularly the border states?
Dr. Brothers. Yes.
Mr. Weber. And so you have that mechanism in place already?
Dr. Brothers. So there's a mechanism in place right now
with our first responders. The first responders group right now
has publicly available information on what some of the
capability gaps are, so that's available, and that's the goal
for the other IPTs as well.
Mr. Weber. Okay. Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Weber.
The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Babin, is recognized for his
questions.
Mr. Babin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Dr.
Brothers.
How does S&T determine the allocation of resources to basic
research, applied research, and development? How do you
prioritize that?
Dr. Brothers. So when I first came on board, the previous
Under Secretary, Dr. O'Toole, because of external pressures,
she had put most of our investment in nearer-term research. One
of the comments that I've made a couple times has been I think
that it's important that we have a more balanced portfolio than
just all near term. I think it's important because as we start
looking at, as I mentioned earlier, as we start looking at what
industry has to offer, what university research has to offer in
terms of potential solutions, we also have to realize there's
some things industry does invest in, and those areas we have to
be willing to put in a long-term investment profile. So
therefore, we have to look at--we can't just look at what comes
up in the next 18 months. We have to say if we're going toward
these visionary goals, how do we actually do that? If these
visionary goals are 15, 20, 30 years out, what do we need to
put in place to actually start approaching those things? And I
think that requires an investigation profile that's not just
near term but involves--can involve some aspects of basic
research as well.
Mr. Babin. Thank you. And what has S&T done to improve
state and local government access to technology that improves
the safety and effectiveness of law enforcement?
Dr. Brothers. Sure. So I think we have a SAVER program with
our first responders group, which----
Mr. Babin. Did you say SAVER?
Dr. Brothers. It's called the SAVER program, which frankly
is--it starts to compare and contrast different technologies
for first responders. We have another group that looks at
capability gaps for first responders. So I think--and this is
all shared with state and locals.
Mr. Babin. Okay. Let's see. A July 31st, 2014, GAO report
entitled ``Continued Actions Needed to Strengthen Oversight and
Coordination of Research and Development'' states that DHS had
not yet determined the most effective path to guide R&D across
the Department. Does DHS now have an effective way to guide
R&D?
Dr. Brothers. As of the signing of the memo on IPTs, I
think we do. I think we absolutely do.
Mr. Babin. Okay. If that's so, then how does DHS determine
the most effective path to guide R&D and why didn't DHS do this
since its very inception?
Dr. Brothers. So the IPT process, that is something I'm
bringing back. It did exist in the past for a variety of
reasons. I think one thing that was not codified, it was an
S&T-only process. The process is now one that spans the
Department based on the memo I mentioned. So I think there's
more institutional buy-in, if you will, to the IPT process. So
this is something that was done before, it was stopped, and now
we're starting it again, and I think on better, more solid
footing.
Mr. Babin. Well, I congratulate you, but what happened to
your predecessors?
Dr. Brothers. What happened to them?
Mr. Babin. Well, why----
Dr. Brothers. Why didn't they do that?
Mr. Babin. Yes.
Dr. Brothers. So two predecessors ago started the IPT
process. Admiral Cohen started the IPT process. He started it
based on his knowledge of something called future naval
capabilities in the Navy. I'm familiar with them from when I
was in DOD. My immediate predecessor chose to discontinue
those. Again, I think part of the challenge was, the original
IPTs were not necessarily supported as strongly by the entire
Department as they are right now.
This has to do with the Secretary's Unity of Effort. You
know, the Secretary's Unity of Effort has made a significant
difference in the entire Department, and right now the IPTs are
part of this Unity of Effort that the Secretary has codified.
Mr. Babin. Okay. Do you have reason to believe that GAO
would concur with this?
Dr. Brothers. I can't speak for GAO but I think it's a
compelling argument.
Mr. Babin. Okay. I yield back the balance of my time, Mr.
Chairman. Thank you.
Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Babin.
Mr. Babin. Thank you, Dr. Brothers.
Chairman Smith. The gentleman from Illinois, Mr. Lipinski,
is recognized for his questions.
Mr. Lipinski. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I want to thank
you, Dr. Brothers, for your testimony.
You stated in your testimony that you're using Centers of
Excellence to plug into the research community, especially on
urgent issues such as countering unmanned aerial systems and
violent extremism. I understand that S&T currently has eight
Centers of Excellence and set up three more last year. One of
these new centers is the Center for Borders, Trade, and
Immigration. There's also a Border Security Integrated Product
Team. So I want to ask, how do you ensure that the research
being done at the Centers of Excellence is integrated with the
overall R&D priorities of the Directorate and that findings
from the university partners make their way past the basic
research phase to the development and testing work?
Dr. Brothers. Thank you. Having done university work
myself, having sponsored university work both from industry and
from department of Defense, I can tell you that I was really
amazed at how different the S&T is doing university-funded
research, sponsored research. We're actually coming in the
front end. So a lot of grants that go to universities are just
that, they're grants. They don't necessarily have a research
plan that's defined outright. Our team--our team in the Office
of University Programs does an excellent job developing a
research program before the work actually begins, and that
research plan quite frankly involves the components. I spoke at
one of the starting points for one of the Centers of
Excellence, and I really had to remark at the engagement of the
components of the science engineers at S&T in developing an
effective and a relevant research plan for these universities.
So my goal of aligning the research of the University Centers
of Excellence with those of the IPTs, with those of the
priorities, I think is a reality based on the way these
programs are structured.
Mr. Lipinski. Thank you. I also wanted to move on and talk
a little about the partnerships with the private sector. In
your written testimony, you state that the new Collaborative
Innovation Experiments program helps S&T reach out to non-
traditional performers. Who's your target audience, and how are
they an asset to the R&D program?
Dr. Brothers. Sure. So coming on board from DOD, I was very
familiar with the DIB, defense industrial base, large
companies, the Lockheeds, the General Dynamics, BAEs, et
cetera. One of my concerns coming in, though, was what
companies are going to provide the equivalent Homeland Security
industrial base to S&T. We're different than DOD. A lot of what
we buy is off the shelf, and as such, we have to strategically
shape our shelf. To strategically shape our shelf, we have to
be able to have visibility, have influence and impact on all of
the creative individuals in the country and internationally as
well. So a lot of what we've been doing recently is reaching
out to strategically shape their shelf, has been reaching out
to the companies in Silicon Valley and Dallas and Austin and
Chicago and L.A., et cetera, as a way to increase the creative
minds that are tackling our problems.
And I was out in Silicon Valley, and I started asking some
of the investment professionals, the venture capitalists out
there, you know, what would really get the creative people out
there involved in solving our problems, and their answer was
very simple. They said look, we've got a lot of smart people
here, a lot of smart people, and they're interested in solving
hard problems that make a difference. Hard problems that make a
difference. And I think that as an organization, as a
Department, Homeland Security has an incredibly compelling
mission, and what you find when you talk to these folks, these
new companies, potential entrepreneurs, they get really excited
by solving these problems. They just haven't necessarily known
about them in the past.
So what we've done then is, we've had a coordinated
outreach, and I'm very proud to say that last year we had an
idea. The idea was, could we in this whole sense of
strategically shaping the shelf, could we indeed develop
accelerators. Just a simple question, right? Can we actually
develop business accelerators in our field, in the field of
solving Homeland Security problems, that also represent
effective businesses. So we tried that, and there were three
fundamental questions we needed to answer. One question was,
does anyone care, will we get responses from the solicitation
to have accelerators? The second question was, if anybody
cares, will there be good answers, will we get relevant,
effective solutions? The third question was, are these viable
businesses?
Last September--so this was a little over a year ago,
actually about a year ago--in September after we'd done this,
we had 150 companies or so actually apply. So the first
question was affirmative. There are a lot of creative
professionals out there who are interested in solving our
problems. Coming through this accelerator program--one of the
accelerators was based in Dallas and one was based in Chicago--
we had 18 companies. These companies had excellent solutions
that not only had applicability to first responders because our
accelerators are based on first responder technology, and if I
can segue, it was really concerned with giving first responders
situational awareness: where am I, where are my team, these
kinds of things. And then we had these companies, and they
solved problems with situation awareness for first responders
but they also had commercial value as well. About half of these
have interest from follow-on funding.
So what we've found is that the hypothesis we had, can we
get creative individuals across the country interested in
solving our problems, is yes. Yes, we can. Not only that, I've
reached out to larger companies, and one of the things that I
think is unique about our strategy is we've tried to make
roadmaps that are in the back of our strategy, technology
roadmaps, that a CTO at a large company would get that would
match what they're looking for. Because one of the challenges
large companies have is, how do you use your IRAD--your
independent research and development dollars--effectively?
Well, if you have a roadmap, which you know that your potential
government customer is using, that can help a lot, and that can
help the leadership of those companies make the effective
business case to their leadership to work in a particular area.
Mr. Lipinski. Thank you, and I want to--I know I'm out of
time. I just want to say I just started, with Mr. Hultgren, a
prize caucus here, and I want to ask you following up about the
Directorate's plans to use prize authority. But thank you. I
yield back.
Dr. Brothers. Thank you.
Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Lipinski.
The gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Loudermilk, is recognized.
Mr. Loudermilk. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Dr.
Brothers, for being here.
What you're doing is very broad, and I applaud the efforts
that you've taken so to kind of get you prepared for the
direction I'm going, I want to talk about transportation
security and then port security as well.
I applaud you at the screening at speed. Those of us who
travel often really appreciate that. But at the same time, I
have some grave concerns. As you know, the DHS IG released a
report a few months ago where they failed 95 percent of the
time of inspectors getting banned items through TSA
checkpoints, and also within the last few months, I personally
know of three individuals who inadvertently made it through
screening points with scissors, a flathead screwdriver, and one
who actually in his checked bags had live rounds loaded in a
magazine that were not detected.
Through researching some of where we are, and where I'm
getting is, I'd like your input as to where is that balance and
where are we going in this because that concerns me greatly.
I'm also on the Homeland Security Committee. I've been on
foreign fighter task force. And so yes, we definitely
appreciate the speed of life going through security checkpoints
but to balance that with security, we weigh heavily on the
technology aspect, and I do know in my research that we were
close to having a new set of standards for next-generation
screening technologies but that was put on hold recently to go
back to the drawing board.
I do know, and I've visited some new technologies out there
that use high-energy X-ray to give not only three-dimensional
but four-dimensional view of what's in a bag using basically
medical technologies such as biopsies to be able to tell the
contents or the material, what is likely in the material that's
in a bag.
Can you tell me where are we in advancing to actually field
the new generation of scanning technologies and, you know, and
also maybe opine, have we gone too far in the speed and
efficiency and we've given up on some of the security?
Dr. Brothers. So let me go back--thank you. Let me go back
to the vision. I think the vision, while it talks about
screening at the speed of light, there's always, as you know,
this tradeoff between security and the speed of commerce. I
don't think in any means did that vision mean that we're not
trying to improve security. I think what it means is, you need
to look at the airports, ports of entry holistically. So right
now, you know, you may look at just the screening equipment.
What are other aspects of the process from ticketing on out
that you can actually impact to improve security?
I think with respect to the particular technologies, we're
looking a different technologies, different phenomenologies as
a way of screening for a variety of threat materials, if you
will. We have a transportation security laboratory in New
Jersey that works with TSA to test these types of technologies.
There's an integration facility in DC. that is used for
further--more operational testing.
So I think that there is an understanding across the
Department to look at this problem holistically, to use as much
of the newer technology as possible, but there's another issue
as well. Quite frankly, I learned this going back to DOD as
well, the importance of the human dimension. So I was involved
in some studies when I was in the Department of Defense, and
what was quickly apparent to me was how important the human
dimension really is. We can get caught up in the importance of
technology as much as we want but the tactics, techniques and
procedures that the humans perform are incredibly vital to this
combined function of the human-machine subsystem if you will.
And so we're also involved in research in looking at how to do
better training of the transportation security officers as
well.
So I think we're looking at it not just from the checkpoint
perspective, we're looking at the entire point of entry
perspective and we're also looking at it from the training
perspective.
Mr. Loudermilk. All right. Thank you.
And quickly, as we're going to look at port security very
quickly, I perceive we're going to have some challenges with
potential of the TPP coming through as well as lifting
sanctions on Iran. How are we going to ensure that cargo coming
into the United States is safe, especially that may be coming
from a nation that is sworn to the destruction of the United
States, but also opening up free trade, which I'm all in favor
of, but also knowing that we have a responsibility to ensure
that what is coming into the nation is safe, is secure, it's
legal, and it doesn't bring harm to the United States? Are you
guys looking at advanced technologies and techniques to deal
with the increased load of imports coming into the United
States?
Dr. Brothers. Absolutely. We're also working with our
partners with DNDO as well to look at the different modalities
of threat to come in. We're looking at it from the perspective
of integrated systems assistance, whether that's the actual
screening technology itself or whether that's bringing
information from disparate sources and infusing it in a way to
get better decision support.
Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Loudermilk.
The gentleman from Illinois, Mr. LaHood, is recognized of
his questions.
Mr. LaHood. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and Dr. Brothers,
thank you for being here today and for your testimony.
Following up on Congressman Loudermilk's line of
questioning there on the Inspector General's report that found
the failure of TSA to find the mock explosives and the banned
weapons over 95 percent of the time, so since that occurred and
the analysis that was generated from that, if another say, mock
test was done today, what would be different?
Dr. Brothers. I believe the results would be different but
I think this type--it'd be good to get back to you on a
classified discussion of some of the changes, if you like, that
have been made.
Mr. LaHood. Are you confident there would be a different
outcome of that was done today?
Dr. Brothers. I believe there would be a different outcome,
yes.
Mr. LaHood. And in terms--I know there was a reference
earlier--and by the way, I'd love to have a follow-up on that--
--
Dr. Brothers. Sure.
Mr. LaHood. --to learn more about that and what's occurred
with the new technology.
There was a reference earlier about drones, and I guess
thinking about how we balance drones and the technology with
the private sector and letting them innovate and expand and
privacy rights and also security, can you comment a little bit
on the direction we're headed on that and that appropriate
balance moving forward.
Dr. Brothers. So you know, the FAA is looking at
regulations of having folks register, drone users register. One
of my approaches, quite frankly, has been, when I was in
Silicon Valley a couple weeks ago was to talk to some of the
manufacturing community and say, you know, you really need to
get involved in these discussions because they're important.
There's a tremendous tradeoff between the commerce potential
for these devices as well as the threat, and so I've been
personally engaged with some of the manufacturing community of
drones to understand their potential capabilities going forward
as well as to get their input into what makes sense in terms of
counter-drone technologies as well as some policy issues.
Mr. LaHood. And are you working actively with the FAA on
their----
Dr. Brothers. We are.
Mr. LaHood. And when do you anticipate that will be ready
to go?
Dr. Brothers. I can't tell you. I do not know. I cannot
tell you that. That's something that I think is still a work in
progress.
Mr. LaHood. Another issue that we discussed last week in
this Committee was the issue of cybersecurity, and in looking
at your particular Department and investing appropriately in
research and development programs that will address rising
security concerns as it relates to cybersecurity, can you
comment on that a little bit?
Dr. Brothers. I'm sorry. Could you repeat the question?
Mr. LaHood. Yeah. We had a hearing last week on
cybersecurity and specifically involving power systems and some
of the issues related there in looking at the threats that are
out there. In looking at your Department and specifically with
research and development, can you comment on how your
Department's addressing that?
Dr. Brothers. I can. We've put a focus on cyber-physical
systems, which one substantiation of cyber-physical systems is
a SCADA system, control systems for, let's say, power plants,
these kinds of things. I think this is an area of increasing
concern, and we're working with our partners at Infrastructure
Protection over at NPPD as well. So we're putting together a
program to address the threats to not just the power grid but
also financial sector and the other critical infrastructure
sectors as well.
Mr. LaHood. Thank you. I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. LaHood.
The gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Moolenaar, is recognized
for his questions.
Mr. Moolenaar. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and Dr. Brothers,
thank you for being here with us today.
I was looking through your background, and I noticed you
were with the Department of Defense, and I wondered if you
could tell me what the research and the work that you're doing
now versus the research that's done at the Department of
Defense, what are the similarities and differences between
Homeland Security Science and Technology and Department of
Defense?
Dr. Brothers. A major similarity is the importance of the
missions. I mean----
Mr. Moolenaar. I'm sorry. The----
Dr. Brothers. Of the fundamental importance of the missions
with the Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland
Security. Major differences have to do with the difference in
the budgets of the departments, the fact that a lot of what we
do buy, what our components buy are off the shelf. The fact
that, for example, particularly for our first responder
stakeholders affordability is a big concern. So whereas the
Department of Defense you may find work in hypersonics, for
example, you would not find that type of work in DHS.
That said, where our challenges may not be to exploit new
types of propulsion technologies, our challenges are to get
effective capabilities to our stakeholders that have minimal
training time and much smaller budgets. So whereas the
Department of Defense, the resources are there to do
significant training, that's not necessarily so with our
stakeholders.
Mr. Moolenaar. And then I noticed the Integrated Product
Teams, you have five different areas. Is that too many? I mean,
it seems like a pretty--I mean, they're all very complicated,
challenging areas. Are there one or two that you prioritize
over the other ones?
Dr. Brothers. I don't think so. I think these--the
Integrated Product Teams actually came from QHSR, so if you
look at the different mission sets, that's where they were
derived, and I think that there was strong reasons for having
that set of missions defined in the QHSR and that's why we have
the IPTs set up that way.
Mr. Moolenaar. Okay. And then when you have agencies that
would have a common interest, is there ever kind of this
concept of skin in the game where you have agencies
contributing to pooling resources to fund a project?
Dr. Brothers. So for example, we have some of the work we
do at the borders, sir. Customs and Border Protection is
working with us, is co-funding some of that work. So the answer
to your question is yes.
Mr. Moolenaar. Okay. And have you been able to find--I'm
sure just with your experience in defense as well as, you know,
the other areas, do you feel like we're doing this the most
efficient way or--you know, I could imagine at a large
corporation when they have a research component, you know,
sometimes it's centralized and different entities feed into
that, and there're places each of the different entities would
have their own research component. Do you feel that we're doing
things the best way, most efficient way possible here in the
Federal Government?
Dr. Brothers. So I appreciate you bringing that up because
of time constraints, I wasn't able to talk about that in my
opening statement, but I think that structure is one that we're
trying to implement right now. So when I was in the Department
of Defense, one of my challenges was trying to understand how
to make the Department of Defense laboratories more effective,
if you will, and I started looking at different business
models, corporate models, and it's just like what you say. If
you go to a lot of the large corporations, what you find is,
they'll have a central research facility that tends to look at
cross-cutting, more basic research areas. Then the business
areas, whether--let's take a defense contractor that might have
an electronic warfare business unit that might have a platform
business unit, communications business unit. Each one of these
business units independently have their own R&D section as
well. This will be more applied.
What I found with the more effective of these corporations
was, there was a constant interplay between the staff at the
central research facility and those at the business unit. Why
is that important? It's important because you need the
researchers to understand the market dynamics and you need the
applied engineers to understand the art of the possible from
the basic research. And so we've done that. We started with our
Pioneer program. The Pioneer program actually puts our staff
into, right now into the Coast Guard, for example, into their
R&D center. We've also put our staff on the borders to
understand how the border operators operate.
So I think, getting to your point, a more efficient
operation is that type of model, and that's something we're
trying to do right now. We've already had a number of these
Pioneer events. We're setting up work with the Coast Guard to
collaborate on research right within the Coast Guard. So I
think that is an effective model.
Mr. Moolenaar. Okay. Thank you very much.
Dr. Brothers. Thank you.
Mr. Moolenaar. Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Moolenaar.
The gentleman from Louisiana, Mr. Abraham, is recognized.
Mr. Abraham. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Dr.
Brothers, for being here.
Let me pony a little bit on Mr. Moolenaar's first question
because we are actively in budget talks even as we speak today
and hopefully being good stewards of the people's money, what
is S&T doing to ensure that DHS is not duplicating other
research in other federal agencies, and the second part of that
question, how do you guys prioritize your research?
Dr. Brothers. The first part of the question, right now in
one of the Secretary's Unity of Effort initiatives, we're
involved in the Joint Requirements Council. The Joint
Requirements Council really does the vetting of acquisition
programs and these kinds of things, developing the
requirements, et cetera. We're part of that process, and as
being part of that process, we're able to give our input into
the art of the possible, into what technology's out there.
Internally in S&T, what we tried to do, and I think we've
done an effective job of this, is to give our program managers,
our leaders, access to a variety of different tools to
understand what is out there. So Centers of Excellence were
mentioned earlier. So access to university programs.
Laboratories were mentioned earlier as well. There are
laboratories.
Mr. Abraham. Do you guys hear of any computer programs that
would actually send an alert if you're doing research on the
same topic?
Dr. Brothers. I can't--so what we do have is the ability to
influence the acquisition through the process of the Joint
Requirements Council. I can't say we have a computer program
that generates alerts on everyone's desk but we have effective
input into the acquisition review board information.
Mr. Abraham. And the second part, the prioritization of the
research.
Dr. Brothers. The prioritization of research is now being
done based on the Secretary's direction through this Integrated
Product Team structure, and this is where we have components
who collectively evaluate what capability gaps there are. We
then base our research on what those gaps--what gaps come out
of that process.
Mr. Abraham. And I'm assuming you guys have regular
meetings that you look at this research and say well, this one
needs to go to the top and this one can be----
Dr. Brothers. Correct. So we have portfolio reviews as
well. So once we have defined what direction we'll take in
terms of our prioritization of our investments, we then do an
annual review on these investments.
Mr. Abraham. And what is S&T's role in the DHS
acquisitions?
Dr. Brothers. So we have authority to do operational tests,
to oversee operational tests and evaluation, and we're now
getting involved in the system engineering up front for
acquisition programs as well as developmental testing as well.
So it's the testing and engineering up front. The back end is
system engineering up front.
Mr. Abraham. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
Dr. Brothers. Thank you.
Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Abraham.
We have no other Members who are here to ask questions but
we had a nice, full contingent today. So Dr. Brothers, thank
you for appearing, thank you for the information, and to follow
up on a couple of things that you said earlier, we'll look
forward to a classified briefing at some point to address some
of the issues that were brought up earlier.
But I appreciate what you're doing at the Department of
Homeland Security, and we'll be in touch. Thank you very much.
[Whereupon, at 11:25 a.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
Appendix I
----------
Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Responses by The Hon. Reginald Brothers
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
[all]