Today's Top Stories
1. As Real ID Act deadline nears, DHS needs to lead, says GAO
2. Drone strikes do more harm than good for U.S. interests, report says
3. House approves $2.2B FEMA reauthorization
4. GAO: Not eliminating two National Security Cutters will cause 'difficult choices'
5. OIG: FEMA isn't learning as much as it should from national exercises Also Noted: New hurricane chief offers 5 lessons from this season; Court fast-tracks some green card applications; and much more...  Follow @fiercegov on Twitter
More News From the FierceGovernment Network:
1. A third of DHS major IT development projects over schedule or budget, or both
2. OPM can do more to help close skills gap, says Dodaro
3. Continuing resolution will fund government through March 26
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Today's Top News 1. As Real ID Act deadline nears, DHS needs to lead, says GAO
 States have until mid-January to comply with new standards for driver's license security, but the Homeland Security Department needs to give them more support, the Government Accountability Office says.
DHS will determine whether states are compliant, but its guidance has been ad hoc or just in response to specific requests from states, GAO says in a Sept. 21 report (.pdf). The Real ID Act of 2005 set minimum standards for driver's license security. Though states don't have to comply, federal agencies will eventually only accept licenses that meet the standards, so they'll be needed to board commercial airplanes and enter federal buildings. Some state officials told GAO that the lack of guidance from DHS has left them uncertain of whether they'll be in compliance when the law goes into effect. Some also said they're worried about investing resources in efforts that they're not sure will help them comply. In the absence of formal guidance, states have had to make assumptions based in part on informal remarks from DHS officials, GAO says. It can be difficult for states to verify all the documents people use to get driver's licenses, as Real ID requires. GAO investigators were able to fraudulently obtain driver's licenses in several states thanks to counterfeit documents--driver's licenses and birth certificates--that were supposedly issued in other states. A group of states is trying to develop a system to check if an applicant already has a license in another state, since the Real ID Act forbids people from having more than one license. Such a system would also help states determine the legitimacy of out-of-state licenses used as documentation. But that system is years from completion, and the state consortium behind it told GAO it may take until 2023 for states to get all their data on license holders into the system. As for birth certificates, there are thousands of different versions nationwide. Formats vary in different jurisdictions and have also changed over time. GAO recommends that DHS help states find an interim means of addressing cross-state license fraud as well as birth certificate fraud. DHS did not concur, telling GAO that states need to be able to adopt solutions that best fit their circumstances. DHS has also given states grant money to do so. But in response, GAO maintains that DHS should take the lead, and says it can do so without being too prescriptive. For more:
- download the report, GAO-12-893 (.pdf) Related Articles:
State Real ID deadline postponed until Jan. 2013
Real ID deadline won't be extended, says DHS Read more about: GAO report
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2. Drone strikes do more harm than good for U.S. interests, report says
 Drones strikes are not nearly as precise as advertised, and they may inspire more militants than they kill, a Sept. 25 report (.pdf) says.
The report, a joint effort from Stanford and New York University's law schools, is based on two investigations in Pakistan, more than 130 interviews with victims, witnesses and experts, and documents and media reports. In northwest Pakistan, the report finds, civilians constantly worry about drone strikes, people avoid gathering in groups, some children are kept out of school and family members skip funerals. Humanitarian workers and ordinary people also hesitate to aid injured victims because drones often strike an area more than once, the report says. As a result, Pakistani attitudes toward the United States have soured. Pakistanis from the affected area who were interviewed for the report were largely indifferent to the United States before the drone strikes began. But the drone strikes had bred hostility and probably make people more likely to become militants, the report says. Already, it adds, two prominent attempts to bomb New York City--by Faisal Shahzad and Najibullah Zazi--were in part motivated by the drone strikes. Meanwhile, high-level targets make up only an estimated 2 percent of total drone strike casualties, the report says. Low-level fighters and civilians appear to make up far greater shares of the dead. Precise numbers are hard to discern, though, in large part because the United States has concealed information about the strikes, the report says. In light of the questions surrounding the rationale and efficacy of drone strikes, the report calls for the U.S. government to be more transparent about the program. Specifically, the report says the administration should make public the criteria it uses for strikes, the means by which it ensures compliance with international law, and the nature of investigations into civilian death and injury. It also calls for release of the Justice Department memos that serve as the legal basis for drone strikes in Pakistan. There should also be independent investigations into drone strike deaths, the report says. For more:
- download the report, "Living Under Drones: Death, Injury, and Trauma to Civilians From US Drone Strike Practices in Pakistan" (.pdf)
- go to the Living Under Drones website for additional data and resources Related Articles:
Brennan: Drone strikes legal and ethical
State Dept. optimistic about counterterrorism cooperation in Pakistan
State designates Haqqani Network as foreign terrorist organization Read more about: counterterrorism
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3. House approves $2.2B FEMA reauthorization
 The House approved Sept. 19 a $2.2 billion, 2-year reauthorization of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
The bill (H.R. 2903) would authorize in total for fiscal years 2013 and 2014 about $2.1 billion for salaries and expenses--including $37 million to modernize the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System--$71 million for the Urban Search and Rescue Response System, $32 million for dam safety activities and $4 million for emergency management assistance compact grants. Fiscal 2013 starts Oct. 1. The reauthorization bill isn't a spending measure, meaning that even if it does become law, Congress must also approve an appropriations bill to ensure that FEMA receives the authorized money. The government likely will be funded through a continuing resolution through March 26; under a continuing resolution, Congress typically extends a previous year's rate of funding for a set period, with some minor changes. The continuing resolution funds the disaster relief fund at the fiscal 2012 rate of $6.4 billion. When it comes to authorizing funds for the urban search and rescue teams, a report (.pdf) prepared by the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee acknowledges that "existing funding may not be sufficient to cover all needed costs." Estimated sustainment costs for each of the 28 urban search and rescue teams run as high as $1.7 million annually, the committee says, which would require annual federal appropriations of $56 million. "The committee believes these costs should be thoroughly evaluated," the report states. The bill also calls on FEMA to implement new procedures for debris removal assistance and would make fixed estimates the basis for grant amounts. "The traditional method by which FEMA removed debris was fraught with red-tape, slowed the process and was susceptible to fraud and high costs," the report states. The act would also permit federally recognized Indian tribes to submit a request for presidential declaration of a major disaster directly to FEMA. Under current law, only state governors can make such requests. For more:
- go to the THOMAS page for H.R. 2903 Related Articles:
Continuing resolution will fund government through March 26
Threshold for FEMA public assistance grants hasn't kept up with inflation
Many FEMA disaster assistance employees haven't applied for a reservist position
Fugate emphasizes support for direct tribal government FEMA requests Read more about: debris removal, disaster relief fund
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4. GAO: Not eliminating two National Security Cutters will cause 'difficult choices'
 Unless the Coast Guard eliminates the seventh and eight National Security Cutters from its recapitalization program of record, it likely will have to choose from pulling funds away from other Coast Guard acquisitions, or "accept that some capabilities the Coast Guard promised will have to be deferred to later years," says the Government Accountability Office.
In a report (.pdf) dated Sept. 20, the GAO says the current Coast Guard portfolio of 16 major programs has a service-estimated cost of $35.32 billion, a 41 percent increase over the $25.14 billion it anticipated spending. Even that higher number may be inaccurate, since auditors say 10 of the current baselines haven't been updated to reflect recent developments. The service's fiscal 2013 budget proposal already requested for four major acquisitions about $500 million less than their estimated cost, auditors say, naming the Maritime Patrol Aircraft Fast Response Cutter, HC-130J/H aircraft and C4ISR programs. Were the Coast Guard to eliminate the final two of eight planned NSCs from the recapitalization program of record, the future years capital investment plan for fiscals 2013-2017 transmitted in the budget proposal would nearly match total anticipated acquisition funding, the report says. If the Coast Guard were to retain them, the need for acquisition funding would exceed the capital investment plan in fiscal 2014 through 2016--in the first 2 years by more than $600 million annually. 
The Coast Guard budget proposal in fact did not include funding for the last two NSCs in the capital investment plan, in what increasingly appears to have been a decision made by Homeland Security Department officials without the support of the Coast Guard. In August 2011, the DHS Office of Program Analysis & Evaluation conducted a cutter fleet study that concluded that the Coast Guard could make do with 6 NSCs, the GAO report says--making that decision based on a finding that the Coast Guard needs only 3.5 NSCs to fulfill its defense mission. Auditors also say the NSC never underwent a rigorous requirement process, unlike the Offshore Patrol Cutter program--for which the Coast Guard released the final request for proposals on Sept. 25. Offshore Patrol Cutter design specification underwent rigorous cost analysis, including a drop from an acceptable speed of 25 knots to 22 knots, potentially eliminating the need for two diesel engines--and perhaps dropping the cost of each OPC by $10 million. Cost-cutting also eliminated a requirement for an integrated C4ISR system onboard the OPC--although, as a result, OPC won't be able to exchange near-real-time battle data with Defense Department assets. House lawmakers and Senate appropriators both included funding for long lead time materials for the seventh NSC in their versions of fiscal 2013 spending bills--signaling an intention to side with the Coast Guard and not DHS PA&E on the matter. NSC contractor Huntington Ingalls officially laid the keel of the fourth NSC in a Sept. 5 ceremony. For more:
- download the report, GAO-12-918 (.pdf) Related Articles:
Coast Guard fleet operational hours unattainable
Papp: The Coast Guard can't lease all its icebreakers
Coast Guard operational capacity deteriorating Read more about: Office of Program Analysis & Evaluation, Coast Guard
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5. OIG: FEMA isn't learning as much as it should from national exercises
The corrective actions that agencies were tasked with taking after national disaster-response exercises in 2007 and 2009 are less than half complete, a Homeland Security office of inspector general report (.pdf) says. The biennial exercises are meant to assess the nation's capacity to prepare for and respond to a major disaster. The Federal Emergency Management agency runs the exercises, but they involve all levels of government. More than 10,000 people at about 135 sites participated in the 2011 exercise. FEMA's protocol for the exercises focuses on developing corrective actions--steps that need to be taken to close gaps in preparedness. But only 40 percent of the corrective actions from the 2007 and 2009 exercises are complete, says the report, dated Sept. 11. Only some of those actions fall to FEMA to complete. But of the 11 FEMA-specific corrective actions from the 2007 exercise, the report says eight remain open and overdue. One of those corrective actions is a need for a process to determine where to send resources and supplies if there are multiple disaster sites. FEMA is also responsible for two corrective actions from the 2009 exercise. Auditors say both are overdue. Besides corrective actions, the exercises also generate lessons learned. But FEMA has inadequately shared those lessons, auditors say, adding that the agency should have a standardized process to do so. In the absence of such a process, FEMA has missed opportunities to improve its disaster management operations. Auditors say FEMA should issue a manual that outlines the corrective actions and lessons learned processes. FEMA concurred and told OIG in July that its new policy would be completed by August. For more:
- download the report, OIG-12-118 (.pdf) Related Articles:
New focus on national resiliency needed, says report
Resilience gains parity with protection, but how to measure or fund it?
Rand: Health preparedness strong, but questions remain about assessment tool Read more about: FEMA
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Also Noted > New hurricane chief offers five lessons from this season. Article (Sun-Sentinel)
> Court fast-tracks some green card applications. Article (AP via CBS News)
> TSA officers begin voting on first labor contract Oct. 1. Article (GovExec)
> Clinton suggests link to al Qaeda offshoot in deadly Libya attack. Article (NYT)
> Zetas drug trafficker is captured, Mexico says. Article (AP via NYT) And Finally... Hubble captures farthest ever view of the universe. Article (HubbleSite) > American Council for Technology-Industry Advisory Council's 2012 Executive Leadership Conference - October 28-30 - Williamsburg, Va Register today for the American Council for Technology–Industry Advisory Council’s 2012 Executive Leadership Conference, October 28-30, Williamsburg, Va. Join 800+ government and industry leaders and help solve government’s biggest IT challenges.
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