Time Stamp

Ok folks, I have not yet mastered the art of the time stamp and some of my posts have the wrong date and time.  Please bear with me through my technical difficulties.

Homeland Security for Dummies

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has been off to such a great start, in part because of its leadership.  Let's consider its (partial) track record (I invite readers to add to my list):

• Largest and most lethargic bureaucratic agency ever created
• Agencies that should not have been folded into DHS were
• Individuals were named into prominent leadership positions that lacked the background and skills
• Katrina and Rita (need I even say more)
• Changing FEMA much to the detriment of the agency – and now they want to dismantle it!
• Lots of resignation and the inability to hire good solid professionals
• And now the CIA director is stepping down

This is hard for me because (at least with FEMA) emergency management professionals know what they are doing and how to do their jobs.  But where there is no meaningful leadership and political buy-in, it makes it impossible for staff to perform. 

Clark Kent Ervin, a former DHS Inspector General (and incidentally a conservative) has just came out with a new book outlining the departments quagmire – and it’s coming from the top.  Ervin’s book, Open Target, discusses in-depth, how he attempted to tell former Secretary Tom Ridge that there were serious problems within DHS and lack of leadership in pushing implementation of critical programs and fixing problems.  Of course, he was dismissed.

And that includes FEMA.  At the start of the administration, and before 9/11, the President was going to start to implement some changes in FEMA, but then 9/11 happened and things changed suddenly.  DHS was formed as a political reaction not entirely thought out.  FEMA suffered immensely, but so did the other agencies.  Amidst the changes and transitions, the wrong people were placed in leadership positions.  Not because there was something necessarily “wrong” with the political appointees (I met Brown once, he’s a nice guy), but because they didn’t have the necessary background to run these CRITICAL agencies.  And they are critical agencies. 

I know I blew some steam in my previous posting about dismantling FEMA, but it’s because we are still witnessing our politicians reacting and shooting from the hip instead of fixing the problem: create a culture of information sharing, have the necessary and most-technologically advance technology available, give political and financial priority to the agencies, place proper and knowledgeable leadership in positions of authority and senior management, work on mending the sorely bruised work-place environment and culture. 

The Pogoblog (Project On Government Oversight) conducted an interview with Ervin, who is now working at the Aspen Institute.  Also, John Stewart recently had him on his show.  Check out the streaming media. (PS – Stewart also had a great interview with Madame Secretary Madeleine Albright!).