Committee Discusses DHS S&T Directorate
(Washington, DC) - Today the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology held a hearing to inform the reauthorization of the Department of Homeland Security’s Science and Technology Directorate (DHS S&T). The Committee shares jurisdiction with the Committee on Homeland Security on research, development, demonstration, and standards-related activities of DHS, and oversees the activities of both S&T Directorate and the Domestic Nuclear Detection Office (DNDO). Testifying before the Committee was Dr. Reginald Brothers, DHS Under Secretary for the Science and Technology Directorate.
Ranking Member Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX) described the issues that the Committee has previously discussed and the progress that Dr. Brothers has made. She said, "We’ve heard testimony about GAO’s 2012 recommendation that ‘DHS develop policies and guidance for defining, overseeing, coordinating, and tracking [Research and Development (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.”
Democratic Members of the Committee discussed what steps are being taken to institutionalize new programs at the Directorate, whether Congress should codify an organizational structure for S&T, and what procedures are in place to integrate research done with university partners into the overall R&D priorities of the Directorate.
Congresswoman Johnson stressed the importance of moving forward to implement the strategic plan. She said to Dr. Brothers, “While I’m sure it was not easy, 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.”
Dr. Brothers testified, “I believe that we have begun to see significant progress across the board. At S&T, we are trying out numerous new ideas and ways of doing things. We look at what works well, build it up, and stop what does not. In the process, I believe we are reinventing federal R&D and preserving it as an engine of innovation within government. Given the reality of homeland security today, with threats that move quickly and do not wait for government to react, we must keep improving at S&T. In ten years, I expect S&T to be even better integrated into the Department and the [Homeland Security Enterprise]. I expect our technical staff to live and breathe with operators as trusted technical advisers and innovation agents who make operational missions safer and easier to achieve. I see a Homeland Security Industrial Base that rallies around homeland security challenges and helps make the public safer.”
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