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+ - PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT: STRENGTHENING HOMELAND SECURITY BY EXERCISING TERRORISM SCENARIOS
+
+[House Hearing, 108 Congress]
+[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
+
+
+
+
+ PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT:
+ STRENGTHENING HOMELAND SECURITY
+ BY EXERCISING TERRORISM SCENARIOS
+
+=======================================================================
+
+ HEARING
+
+
+ before the
+
+ SELECT COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY
+ HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
+
+ ONE HUNDRED EIGHTH CONGRESS
+
+ SECOND SESSION
+
+ __________
+
+ JUlY 8, 2004
+
+ __________
+
+ Serial No. 108-53
+
+ __________
+
+ Printed for the use of the Select Committee on Homeland Security
+
+
+ Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/
+ index.html
+
+ __________
+
+
+
+ U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
+
+24-733 WASHINGTON : 2005
+_________________________________________________________________
+For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government
+Printing Office Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free
+(866) 512-1800; DC area (202) 512-1800 Fax: (202) 512-2250 Mail:
+Stop SSOP, Washington, DC 20402-0001
+
+
+
+ SELECT COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY
+
+
+
+ Christopher Cox, California, Chairman
+
+Jennifer Dunn, Washington Jim Turner, Texas, Ranking Member
+C.W. Bill Young, Florida Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi
+Don Young, Alaska Loretta Sanchez, California
+F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr., Edward J. Markey, Massachusetts
+Wisconsin Norman D. Dicks, Washington
+David Dreier, California Barney Frank, Massachusetts
+Duncan Hunter, California Jane Harman, California
+Harold Rogers, Kentucky Benjamin L. Cardin, Maryland
+Sherwood Boehlert, New York Louise McIntosh Slaughter, New
+Joe Barton, Texas York
+Lamar S. Smith, Texas Peter A. DeFazio, Oregon
+Curt Weldon, Pennsylvania Nita M. Lowey, New York
+Christopher Shays, Connecticut Robert E. Andrews, New Jersey
+Porter J. Goss, Florida Eleanor Holmes Norton, District of
+Dave Camp, Michigan Columbia
+Lincoln Diaz-Balart, Florida Zoe Lofgren, California
+Bob Goodlatte, Virginia Karen McCarthy, Missouri
+Ernest J. Istook, Jr., Oklahoma Sheila Jackson-Lee, Texas
+Peter T. King, New York Bill Pascrell, Jr., New Jersey
+John Linder, Georgia Donna M. Christensen, U.S. Virgin
+John B. Shadegg, Arizona Islands
+Mark E. Souder, Indiana Bob Etheridge, North Carolina
+Mac Thornberry, Texas Ken Lucas, Kentucky
+Jim Gibbons, Nevada James R. Langevin, Rhode Island
+Kay Granger, Texas Kendrick B. Meek, Florida
+Pete Sessions, Texas Ben Chandler, Kentucky
+John E. Sweeney, New York
+
+ John Gannon, Chief of Staff
+
+ Stephen DeVine, Deputy Staff Director and General Counsel
+
+ Thomas Dilenge, Chief Counsel and Policy Director
+
+ David H. Schanzer, Democrat Staff Director
+
+ Mark T. Magee, Democrat Deputy Staff Director
+
+ Michael S. Twinchek, Chief Clerk
+
+ (II)
+
+
+
+ C O N T E N T S
+
+ ----------
+ Page
+
+ STATEMENTS
+
+The Honorable Christopher Cox, a Representative in Congress From
+ the State of California, and Chairman, Select Committee on
+ Homeland Security:
+ Oral Statement................................................. 1
+ Prepared Statement............................................. 2
+The Honorable Jim Turner, a Representative in Congress From the
+ State of Texas, Ranking Member, Select Committee on Homeland
+ Security:
+ Oral Statement................................................. 2
+ Prepared Statement............................................. 4
+The Honorable Robert E. Andrews, a Representative in Congress
+ From the State of New Jersey................................... 41
+The Honorable Donna M. Christensen, a Delegate in Congress From
+ the U.S. Virgin Islands........................................ 44
+The Honorable Norman D. Dicks, a Representative in Congress From
+ the State of Washington........................................ 38
+The Honorable Jennifer Dunn, a Representative in Congress From
+ the State of Washington........................................ 5
+The Honorable Jim Gibbons, a Representative in Congress From the
+ State of Nevada................................................ 36
+The Honorable Bennie G. Thompson, a Representative in Congress
+ From the State of Mississippi.................................. 34
+
+ WITNESSES
+
+Mr. Thomas O. Mefford, Director, DuPage County Office of Homeland
+ Security and Emergency Management State of Illinois:
+ Oral Statement................................................. 22
+ Prepared Statement............................................. 24
+
+Ms. C. Suzanne Mencer, Executive Director, Office for State and
+ Local Government Coordination and Preparedness, Department of
+ Homeland Security:
+ Oral Statement................................................. 6
+ Prepared Statement............................................. 8
+
+Accompanied by:
+Mr. Corey D. Gruber, Associate Director, Office for Domestic
+ Preparedness, Department of Homeland Security.................. 28
+
+Mr. Clark S. Kimerer, Deputy Chief of Operations, Seattle Police
+ Department, Seattle Washington:
+ Oral Statement................................................. 16
+ Prepared Statement............................................. 18
+
+ APPENDIX
+
+Material Submitted for the Record:
+ Questions for Ms. C. Suzanne Mencer............................ 47
+ Prepared Statement of Advanced Systems Technology, Inc48
+
+
+ PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT:
+
+
+
+ STRENGTHENING HOMELAND SECURITY BY EXERCISING TERRORISM SCENARIOS
+
+ ----------
+
+
+ Thursday, July 8, 2004
+
+ House of Representatives,
+ Select Committee on Homeland Security,
+ Washington, DC.
+ The committee met, pursuant to call, at 1:11 p.m., in room
+210, Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Christopher Cox
+[chairman of the committee] presiding.
+ Present: Representatives Cox, Dunn, Camp, Gibbons, Turner,
+Thompson, Dicks, Andrews, Lofgren, McCarthy, Christensen,
+Etheridge, Lucas and Langevin.
+ Chairman Cox. Welcome. The Select Committee on Homeland
+Security will come to order. The committee is meeting today to
+examine how terrorism preparedness exercises function in
+strengthening the Federal, State and local government homeland
+security response capabilities.
+ In order to allow us to hear from our witnesses more
+quickly, I would ask members to waive or limit the duration of
+oral opening statements. Those who are present within 5 minutes
+of the gavel and waive their opening statements will be
+allotted 3 additional minutes for questioning the panel. If
+members have written statements, they may be included in the
+hearing record.
+ As most of you know, this committee recently reported
+H.R.266, the Faster and Smarter Funding For First Responders
+Act. This bill authorizes $3.4 billion annually to aid first
+responders in both preventing and responding to acts of
+terrorism through improved planning, equipment, training and
+exercises. We expect this important bill to be considered on
+the House floor shortly.
+ Today, we examine how one part of the grant funds
+authorized by this bill will be used to strengthen our Nation
+through terrorism preparedness exercises. Scenario-based
+training is critical to an effective counterterrorism program
+because the terrorist threat is often not visible. We need to
+remind ourselves through training of how real and enduring this
+threat is, as we were reminded again today by Secretary Ridge.
+The stakes are high.
+ In evaluating FEMA's response to the Oklahoma City bombing,
+the General Accounting Office cited a number of unique
+terrorism-related challenges. The arrival agencies on the scene
+weren't coordinated in their times of arrival. There was a
+clear need to better integrate typical law enforcement
+functions, such as preserving the chain of evidence, with
+typical disaster response and recovery functions, such as
+clearing rubble.
+ The mission to create a national strategy for terrorism
+preparedness exercises began with President Bush's national
+strategy for homeland security. It was codified in the Homeland
+Security Act, which gave the Department of Homeland Security
+the specific responsibility to coordinate preparedness efforts,
+as well as to work with State and local entities on exercises
+to combat terrorism.
+ In response to this mandate, the Department has focused on
+two areas, national programs and State and local programs. The
+national program focuses broadly on the Federal Government's
+response and coordination of Federal, State and local
+resources. For example, the TOPOFF exercise series takes place
+over multiple days and tests the ability of several communities
+to respond to weapons of mass destruction. TOPOFF 2 was
+conducted almost 1 year ago and involved over 20,000
+participants, over 25 Federal, State and local agencies and
+departments and the government of Canada.
+ We are fortunate to have with us today key participants in
+the 2003 TOPOFF 2 exercises from both the Chicago and Seattle
+sites. I look forward to hearing the assessments of our
+witnesses on the strengths and weaknesses of the TOPOFF
+exercise.
+ TOPOFF 2 cost $16 million, but it provided valuable
+lessons. Agencies were able to rehearse for the first time the
+actions they would take when the homeland security advisory
+system is elevated to red. Should highways be closed? Should
+airports be closed? Who is going to make these decisions? The
+exercise allowed us to see the consequences of making these
+very decisions. Similarly, the original TOPOFF exercise
+revealed difficulties in distributing the strategic national
+stockpile.
+ Since then, HHS, DHS, and State and local governments have
+focused on remedying these problems; and we are now better
+prepared to deliver and distribute the stockpile than we were
+before TOPOFF.
+ The Department clearly needs a robust terrorism
+preparedness exercise program. It needs a program that is
+coordinated across the Department and is programmed to share
+data and lessons learned with State and local governments and,
+when appropriate, with the private sector. It is our intent to
+codify and expand some of these exercise program elements in
+the committee's first-ever DHS authorization bill.
+ We are fortunate today to have representatives from the
+front lines in this terrorism preparedness effort, from the
+Department of Homeland Security, from the Seattle Police
+Department and from the DuPage County Office of Emergency
+Management. I look forward to hearing your thoughts and
+testimony today.
+
+ Prepared Statement of the Honorable Christopher Cox
+
+ As most of you know, this Committee recently reported out H.R.
+3266, The Faster and Smarter Funding for First Responders Act. This
+bill authorizes a $3.4 billion annually to aid first responders in both
+preventing and responding to acts of terrorism--through improved
+planning, equipment, training, and exercises. We expect this important
+bill to be considered on the House floor shortly.
+ Today, we examine how one part of the grant funds authorized by
+this bill will be used to strength,en our Nation through terrorism
+preparedness exercises. Scenario-based training is critical to an
+effective counterterrorism program because the terrorist threat is
+often not visible and complacency can easily set in. We need to remind
+ourselves through training of how real and enduring this threat is--as
+we were reminded again this morning by Secretary Ridge. The stakes are
+high. In evaluating FEMA's response to the Oklahoma City bombing, GAO
+cited a number of unique, terrorism-related challenges. The arrival
+agencies on the scene were not coordinated. There was a clear need to
+better integrate typical law enforcement functions, like preserving the
+chain of evidence, with typical disaster response and recovery
+functions, like clearing rubble.
+ The mission to create a national strategy for terrorism
+preparedness exercises began with President Bush's National Strategy
+for Homeland Security and was codified in the Homeland Security Act,
+which gave DHS the specific responsibility to coordinate preparedness
+efforts at the Federal level, as well as to work with state and local
+entities on exercises to combat terrorism. In response to this mandate,
+the Department has focused on two areas--national programs and state
+and local programs.
+ The National Program focuses broadly on the Federal Government's
+response and coordination of federal, state and local resources. For
+example, the TOPOFF exercise series takes place over multiple days and
+tests the ability of several communities to respond to weapons of mass
+destruction. TOPOFF 2 was conducted almost one year ago, and involved
+over 20,000 participants, and over 25 federal, state, and local
+agencies and departments, and the Canadian Government. We are fortunate
+to have with us today key participants in the 2003 TOPOFF 2 exercises
+from both the Chicago and Seattle sites. I look forward to hearing the
+assessments of our witnesses as to the strengths and weaknesses of the
+TOPOFF exercise.
+ TOPOFF 2 cost $16 million, but it provided valuable lessons.
+Agencies were able to rehearse, for the first time, the actions they
+would take when the Homeland Security Advisory System is elevated to
+Red. Should highways be closed? Should airports be closed? Who would
+make these decisions? The exercise allowed us to see the consequences
+of making these very decisions. Similarly, the original TOPOFF exercise
+revealed difficulties in distributing the Strategic National Stockpile.
+Since then, HHS, DHS and state and local governments have focused on
+remedying these problems, and we are now better prepared to deliver and
+distribute the Stockpile than we were before TOPOFF.
+ The Department clearly needs a robust terrorism-preparedness
+exercise program. It needs a program that is coordinated across the
+Department and is programmed to share data and lessons learned with
+state and local governments and, when appropriate, with the private
+sector. It is our intent to codify and expand some of these exercise
+program elements in the Committee's first-ever DHS authorization bill.
+ We are fortunate today to have representatives from the front lines
+in this terrorism preparedness effort--from the Department of Homeland
+Security, the Seattle Police Department and the DuPage County Office of
+Emergency Management. I look forward to hearing your thoughts and
+testimony today.
+
+ I now recognize the Ranking Member, Jim Turner of Texas,
+for an opening statement.
+ Mr. Turner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman; and welcome to all of
+our witnesses. We look forward to hearing about your experience
+with the TOPOFF exercise series. I think it is very critical
+that we do these kind of exercises, and I know that you will
+have some good reports and information to share with us about
+the exercises that have been conducted to date. There is no
+doubt that effective exercises at all levels of government will
+help us to be prepared in the event of a terrorist attack, and
+I commend you on your efforts and your work in this area.
+ There are several issues that I hope you will try to
+address in your comments to us today.
+ First, I am concerned about how we develop the scenarios
+for the exercises. Do we rely upon the intelligence
+information, the threat, and the vulnerability assessments that
+our Department of Homeland Security is supposed to be
+preparing? Or do the scenarios come from some other source? If
+we are not using the threat and vulnerability information, it
+seems to me that we are not conducting the exercises that we
+may need to be conducting; and I would like to hear how the
+scenario development process occurs.
+ Second, I would like to know a little bit about how the
+Department of Homeland Security measures the effectiveness of
+these exercises. What readiness level are you seeking to
+achieve? How does the conduct of an exercise contribute to our
+State and local governments' overall preparedness? And,
+following an exercise, do the Department and the participating
+State and locality have a clear understanding of what
+additional planning, training, and equipment is necessary to
+prepare that impacted community for that kind of terrorist
+incident?
+ Third, I would be interested in knowing if the actual--or
+if the conduct of these exercises has actually led to fixing
+any of the problems that were discovered.
+ The exercise I understand we are going to hear about today
+occurred about a year ago, in May of 2003; and it would be
+interesting to know not only how the exercise was carried out
+but, perhaps more importantly, how DHS and the Cities of
+Seattle and Chicago have addressed the shortfalls that were
+uncovered through the exercise.
+ It is my understanding that the after action report for
+that exercise revealed that there was little understanding of
+inter--or intra-agency command and control protocols, that many
+exercise players did not fully understand their reporting
+relationships with Federal officials, that a number of major
+pre-existing interagency Federal plans and processes were
+circumvented during the exercise. There were logistical
+difficulties accessing DHS assets and resources, and there was
+a lack of a robust and efficient emergency communications
+infrastructure in the Chicago hospital system that impeded
+response.
+ All of those issues seem to be important, and the more
+interesting side of your testimony would be what have we done
+since that exercise to solve those uncovered problems. So I
+would appreciate a description of what lessons we learned and
+how have we responded to them.
+ So thank you so much for being here, and we appreciate very
+much the good work that you are doing. Thank you.
+
+ Prepared Statement of Jim Turner
+
+ Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
+ Director Mencer, welcome back. Mr. Mefferd and Mr. Kimmerer,
+welcome to Washington. Thank you all for appearing before the Select
+Committee today, and I look forward to your testimony on the Department
+of Homeland Security's exercise programs, and specifically the TOPOFF
+exercise series.
+ The Department of Homeland Security, and particularly the Office
+for Domestic Preparedness, plays a crucial role in preparing our
+country to win the war on terror. It oversees a range of programs to
+prepare our first responders, individually, and our communities, more
+broadly, to prepare for and respond to acts of terrorism. It is
+critical that the job is done right.
+ Effective exercises at all levels of government are a key component
+of our terrorism preparedness activities. The Arlington County,
+Virginia Fire Department's after-action report on their response to the
+9-11 attack noted that frequent training and exercises with the Federal
+Bureau of Investigation, the Pentagon, and the Military District of
+Washington made a substantial contribution to their successful response
+operation.
+ Therefore, the Department is to be commended for its commitment to
+a robust exercise program, particularly the TOPOFF program, and for the
+efforts it has undertaken to provide state and local governments with
+guidance on developing and conducting exercises.
+ However, there are several issues that I would like you to address
+either in your testimony or in response to the Committee's questions.
+ First, I am concerned that in the development of exercise
+scenarios, DHS does not utilize threat and vulnerability information to
+guide its choice of either the location of the incident, or the mode of
+terrorist attack. Why don't the TOPOFF exercises focus on what the
+intelligence assessment indicates is a city's highest vulnerability? I
+am afraid that Department's inability to develop a comprehensive threat
+and vulnerability assessment--which has been noted by this Committee on
+numerous occasions--has a significant, negative impact on the conduct
+of your exercise program.
+ Second, how is DHS measuring the effectiveness of its exercise
+program? What ``readiness'' level are you seeking to achieve in the
+exercise venues, and how does the conduct of an exercise contribute to
+a state or local government's overall preparedness? Following an
+exercise, do DHS and the participating states and localities have a
+clear understanding of what additional planning, training, and
+equipment are necessary to fully prepare the impacted communities?
+ Third, while the actual conduct of exercises is important, it is
+equally important to fix the problems revealed by the exercise. The
+TOPOFF exercise we will hear about today took place over a year ago, in
+May of 2003. At this point, while I am interested in how the exercise
+was carried out, I am much more interested in how both DHS and the
+cities of Seattle and Chicago addressed any shortfalls in their
+response operations. For example, the after-action report for the
+TOPOFF 2 exercises noted the following:
+ There was little understanding of inter- and intra-
+ agency command and control protocols, and many exercise players
+ did not fully understand the reporting relationships among
+ federal officials;
+ A number of major, pre-existing interagency federal
+ plans and processes were circumvented during the exercise;
+ There were logistical difficulties accessing DHS
+ assets and resources; and
+ A lack of a robust and efficient emergency
+ communications infrastructure in Chicago's hospital system
+ impeded response, and resource demands challenged these
+ hospitals throughout the exercise.
+ I am interested in understanding how you have improved your
+operations since the exercise to assure us, and the nation, that in the
+event of a real terrorist attack, we will not repeat the same mistakes.
+Therefore, I would appreciate a description of how any lessons learned
+from the exercise have been incorporated into either the Department's,
+or your city's, day-to-day policy decisions, and the specific
+corrective actions you have undertaken to remedy any operational
+deficiencies.
+ Finally, I am not convinced that the Department is taking full
+advantage of the exercise knowledge and expertise resident in a number
+of its components, such as FEMA and the Coast Guard. These agencies
+were conducting multi-agency, intergovernmental exercises long before
+the Department of Homeland Security was created. I recognize that the
+Office for Domestic Preparedness has been tasked with managing the
+National Exercise Program; however, DHS must begin the process of
+integrating the vast resources under its control to build the most
+effective programs.
+ As you can see, I have many questions and concerns about the
+Department's exercise program. I hope that in addition to describing
+your experiences in the TOPOFF 2 exercise, you can directly address the
+questions I have raised. Thank you for being here, and I look forward
+to your testimony.
+
+ Chairman Cox. Thank the gentleman.
+ The Chair recognizes the Vice Chairwoman of the full
+committee, Jennifer Dunn of Washington.
+ Ms. Dunn. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman; and we are
+delighted that you are here with us today, panel. We look
+forward--having heard bits and pieces of what happens as a
+result of the analysis of TOPOFF--to seeing the big picture in
+your eyes.
+ Mr. Chairman, we are especially lucky today to have a local
+official from my hometown and my State of Washington, Deputy
+Chief Clark Kimerer, who is number two at the Seattle Police
+Department, on this panel today; and he will bring a unique
+perspective because he was actually there on the ground in May
+of last year at the TOPOFF 2 exercise. He started at the
+Seattle Police Department in 1983 as an officer; and now, as
+Deputy Chief of Operations, he oversees the Investigation and
+Emergency Preparedness Bureau.
+ Chief Kimerer, you recognize some of the people on this
+panel because some of them met with you when we were in town
+for a field hearing last fall; and we appreciate your coming
+back to Washington, D.C., to discuss with us again in more
+detail the perspective of those who were on the ground in
+Seattle the day of TOPOFF 2. We look forward to your testimony.
+ With that, Mr. Chairman, I will yield back.
+ Chairman Cox. I thank the gentlelady.
+ Are there further opening statements?
+ If not, I now ask unanimous consent that a video from the
+Department of Homeland Security be shown at this time. Without
+objection, so ordered.
+ [Video played.]
+ Chairman Cox. That video, of course, reflects what we
+actually conducted as an exercise during TOPOFF 2. It was I
+think quite clearly prepared by the Department of Homeland
+Security and sets the stage for the testimony of our next
+witnesses by providing a visual representation of how exercises
+are designed and conducted.
+ We will now hear testimony from our three witnesses; and I
+want to remind our witnesses that, under our committee rules,
+they should strive to limit their opening remarks to 5 minutes.
+Each witness's entire written statement, at full length, will
+appear in the record. We will also allow the entire panel to
+testify before the questioning of any witness.
+ Chairman Cox. The Chair now recognizes our first witness,
+Ms. Suzanne Mencer, Executive Director of the Office for State
+and Local Government Coordination and Preparedness of the
+Department of Homeland Security. Miss Mencer, welcome.
+
+ STATEMENT OF C. SUZANNE MENCER
+
+ Ms. Mencer. Thank you very much, Chairman Cox. I appreciate
+the opportunity to be here today.
+ It is certainly my pleasure, on behalf of Secretary Ridge,
+to talk about our homeland security exercise programs. I want
+to thank you, Mr. Chairman, and all the members of this
+committee for your ongoing support for the Department of
+Homeland Security, for the Office for Domestic Preparedness and
+for the new consolidated Office of State and Local Government
+Coordination and Preparedness. Congress has long been a
+champion of rigorous exercise programs as an important
+contributor to our Nation's preparedness, and made early and
+critical investments in what have today become very highly
+successful programs.
+ Over the past 6 years, SLGCP, which is our very long
+acronym, has supported nearly 400 exercises. We conduct these
+exercises in the firm belief that they are a cornerstone of
+preparedness. Our experience and data show that exercises are a
+practical, efficient and cost-effective way to prepare for
+crises. They test our resilience, identify procedural
+difficulties and provide a plan for corrective actions without
+the penalties that might be incurred in a real crisis. Short of
+an actual incident, exercises provide the ``final test'' for
+our preparedness.
+ SLGCP provides exercise support through its Homeland
+Security Exercise and Evaluation Program. Through this program,
+SLGCP State exercise managers and support teams work with
+States, Territories and designated urban areas to help
+establish exercise programs and develop a multi-year exercise
+schedule. On average, States plan about 20 exercises a year.
+ In addition, as you know, Mr. Chairman, at the direction of
+Congress, SLGCP has conducted two Top Officials, or TOPOFF,
+national exercises that involved the participation of all key
+personnel who would participate in an actual terrorist event.
+The first exercise in May 2000 was, at the time, the largest
+counterterrorism exercise ever conducted in the United States,
+with over 6,000 participants. The States of New Hampshire and
+Colorado served as our pioneer venues.
+ Then, last year, just 2 months after the Department of
+Homeland Security was established, Secretary Ridge personally
+led his team and the Nation through a week-long TOPOFF 2 full-
+scale exercise. Sixteen major exercise activities were
+conducted in the States of Washington and Illinois for 103
+Federal, State, local and international departments and
+agencies. These exercises involved 20,000 domestic and
+international participants, including senior U.S. and Canadian
+government officials.
+ Following TOPOFF 2, Secretary Ridge directed my office to
+develop a comprehensive national homeland security exercise
+program. Congress has provided the resources necessary to build
+a program that will ensure that the homeland security community
+is trained, practiced and able to perform its assigned homeland
+security missions.
+ Implementation of this program is well under way, including
+the design and development of a third TOPOFF exercise. TOPOFF
+3, which will involve the States of New Jersey and Connecticut
+and the governments of the United Kingdom and Canada, promises
+to be the largest, most productive exercise ever conducted by
+the United States and its allies.
+ In addition to direct exercise support, we have also worked
+with our Federal, State and local partners to develop exercise
+policy and doctrine. We have produced a series of manuals and
+compiled hundreds of exercise references that are available
+through a secure but unclassified Web portal we established for
+the homeland security community. We have been hard at work
+evaluating models, simulations and games to identify products
+that meet training and exercise needs when large-scale
+exercises are impractical, and to augment and extend existing
+programs; and we have established a national network of lessons
+learned and best practices for emergency response providers and
+homeland security officials. All this information is available
+through the secure but unclassified Web portal that we
+established for our homeland security community.
+ In closing, I would like to provide just one illustration
+of the value of exercises to our Nation's preparedness. On the
+morning of September 11, 2001, one of our exercise teams was in
+New York City, preparing to assist Mayor Giuliani and his team
+to conduct a full-scale bioterrorism exercise that was
+scheduled for the next day. This exercise would have involved
+upwards of 700 police officers and firefighters. On September
+11th, when the City's emergency operations center went down in
+the World Trade Center attack, the exercise venue, Pier 92,
+became the response and recovery nerve center. Mayor Giuliani
+later described what a robust exercise program meant to the
+City. ``We did not anticipate'', he said, ``that airliners
+would be commandeered and turned into guided missiles. But the
+fact that we practiced for other kinds of disasters made us far
+more prepared to handle a catastrophe that nobody envisioned.''
+ Let me restate the strong commitment of both Secretary
+Ridge and myself to the support of exercises as a cornerstone
+of America's homeland security preparedness. We look forward to
+continuing to work with you, Mr. Chairman, and members of this
+committee and Congress, to insure that our Nation's first
+responders are fully prepared to protect our home towns and our
+homeland.
+ This concludes my statement, and I will be happy to respond
+to any questions that you or members the committee might have.
+And I did bring along Corey Gruber, who was the voice of a lot
+of that video, who lived through both TOPOFF exercises and is
+here to talk about it. Thank you very much.
+ Chairman Cox. Thank you very much.
+ [The statement of Ms. Mencer follows:]
+
+ Prepared Statement of C. Suzanne Mencer
+
+ Chairman Cox, Congressman Turner, and Members of the Committee, my
+name is Sue Mencer, and I serve as Director of the Department of
+Homeland Security's (DHS) Office for State and Local Government
+Coordination and Preparedness (SLGCP). On behalf of Secretary Ridge, it
+is my pleasure to appear before you today to discuss our homeland
+security exercise programs.
+ I want to thank you, Mr. Chairman, and all the members of the
+Committee, for your ongoing support for the Department and for SLGCP.
+Congress has long been a champion of rigorous exercise programs as an
+important contributor to our nation's preparedness, and made early and
+critical investments in what have become today's highly successful
+programs. You and your colleagues have entrusted us with a great
+responsibility in administering these efforts for the nation, and we
+are meeting that charge with the utmost diligence.
+ Mr. Chairman, since its creation in 1998, the Office for Domestic
+Preparedness (ODP), now consolidated with the Office of State and Local
+Government Coordination as the Office of State and Local Government
+Coordination and Preparedness (SLGCP), has provided assistance through
+its preparedness programs to all 50 States, the District of Columbia,
+the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, and the U.S. territories. By the end
+of Fiscal Year 2004, SLGCP will have provided States and localities
+with more than $8.1 billion in assistance and direct support, trained
+550,000 emergency responders from more than 5,000 jurisdictions and
+directly supported nearly 400 exercises.
+ We conduct these exercises in the firm belief that they are a
+cornerstone of preparedness. Our experience and data show that
+exercises are a practical, efficient, and cost-effective way to prepare
+for crises. They test our resilience, identify procedural difficulties,
+and provide a plan for corrective actions to improve capabilities
+without the penalties that might be incurred in a real crisis. They are
+a tangible measure of accountability in the repetitive cycle of
+planning, training, exercising, and assessing our homeland security
+capabilities. Short of an actual incident, they provide the "final
+test" for our preparedness.
+ Congress has played a critical role in laying the foundation for
+our current programs. In 1996, Congress authorized the Nunn-Lugar-
+Domenici Domestic Preparedness Program, an unprecedented undertaking
+which provided training, equipment, technical assistance and exercises
+focused on the threat posed by weapons of mass destruction to 120 of
+the nation's largest urban areas. This effort was initially
+administered by the Department of Defense and subsequently transferred
+to our Office. Each city received direct support in the design,
+development, conduct and evaluation of a series of three exercises,
+including a full-scale (or field) exercise. This Program was the
+forerunner for many of our current initiatives.
+ Today, SLGCP has organized exercise support for States and
+communities into Eastern, Central, and Western Regions through its
+Homeland Security Exercise and Evaluation Program. States are required
+to adopt the Program for exercises conducted with Federal grant funds.
+State Exercise Managers and support teams are assigned to each Region.
+Exercise Managers conduct Exercise Planning Workshops with States,
+Territories, and designated urban areas to aid in program establishment
+and development of a multi-year exercise schedule. On average, states
+have planned twenty annual exercises.
+ Congress has also led the establishment of exercise programs for
+our nation's leaders. In 1999 Congress directed that a Top Officials
+(``TOPOFF'') National Exercise be conducted with the participation ``of
+all key personnel who would participate in an actual terrorist event.''
+The first TOPOFF, a full-scale exercise in May 2000 was, at the time,
+the largest combating terrorism exercise ever conducted in the United
+States. Over 6,000 participants from federal, state and local
+departments and agencies, including Cabinet officials participated. The
+States of New Hampshire and Colorado served as our pioneer venues for
+the first TOPOFF exercise.
+ Again thanks to Congress, the second TOPOFF was a tremendous
+advancement. We were provided with additional funding so we could
+design and conduct a full two-year cycle of exercise activities of
+increasing complexity. Sixteen major exercise activities were conducted
+for 103 Federal, State, local and international departments and
+agencies and 20,000 domestic and international participants, including
+senior officials of the USG and Government of Canada. The States of
+Washington and Illinois were our full partners and provided our
+exercise venues. Through the use of distance learning methodologies, we
+were able to broadcast elements of the exercise series to audiences
+across the nation. Secretary Ridge personally led his team and the
+nation through the week-long TOPOFF 2 full-scale exercise just two
+months after the Department of Homeland Security was established. This
+proved to be an invaluable opportunity for the Department and its
+partners across government to train key personnel in their new homeland
+security roles and responsibilities.
+ Following TOPOFF 2, Secretary Ridge directed my Office to develop a
+comprehensive national homeland security exercise program. Congress
+provided the resources necessary to build a Program that will ensure
+the homeland security community is trained, practiced and able to
+perform its assigned homeland security missions. We worked with our
+partners across government to develop a Program with four principal
+objectives: (1) To provide senior officials and their organizations
+with the opportunity to periodically train and exercise together,
+identify key policy issues, and refine key incident management
+processes/procedures against the range of probable threats; (2) To
+develop common doctrine and provide annual program planning guidance;
+(3) To establish collaborative management processes, supporting
+systems, and multi-year scheduling; and (4) To formalize a system for
+collecting, reporting, analyzing, interpreting, and disseminating
+qualitative as well as quantitative exercise lessons and exemplary
+practices.
+ The importance of a nationally integrated program was reinforced
+when the President issued Homeland Security Presidential Directive/
+HSPD-8, ``National Preparedness,'' in December of last year. HSPD-8
+confirmed the requirement to establish a national program. Our National
+Exercise Program, including the TOPOFF exercise series, will support
+implementation of the National Response Plan and National Incident
+Management System, and the provisions of HSPD-5, issued in February
+2003.
+ Program implementation is well underway, including design and
+development of the third in the series of TOPOFF exercises. New Jersey
+and Connecticut will be our host venues, and Washington and Illinois,
+our partners in TOPOFF 2, will serve as their mentors. We will shortly
+announce the venues for TOPOFF 4, and those States will be invited to
+monitor the design, development, conduct and evaluation of TOPOFF 3.
+This mentoring program is designed to transfer knowledge and experience
+among multiple States and communities by leveraging national-level
+exercise participation. In addition, the Governments of the United
+Kingdom and Canada have committed to participation in what promises to
+be the largest, and surely the most productive exercise series ever
+conducted by the United States Government and its allies
+ To unify homeland security exercise efforts, we have worked
+diligently with our federal, state and local partners to develop
+exercise policy and doctrine. We have produced a series of manuals that
+are employed by our State and local clients, and have been adopted for
+use by several Federal departments and agencies. These manuals and
+hundreds of exercise references are available through a secure but
+unclassified web portal we established for the homeland security
+community. This portal helps us realize our goal of maximizing the
+reuse of exercise investments and products, and in reducing the man-
+hours required to design and develop exercises. The portal is utilized
+by thousands of federal, state and local exercise planners, and
+provides them with the tools and references that accelerate exercise
+design and development and dramatically enhance our ability to share
+information, including lessons and best practices. Our success with the
+portal has led us to use it as a collaborative workspace for many other
+preparedness initiatives.
+ To meet the needs of the millions of first responders that must
+periodically train and exercise together on key action procedures, we
+have been hard at work examining and evaluating models, simulations,
+and games to identify products that meet federal, state, and local
+training and exercise needs when large-scale exercises are impractical,
+and to augment and extend existing programs. The potential benefits
+include increased training and exercise frequency, delivery, realism,
+and lower costs. Two reports commissioned by my Office reviewed nearly
+100 models, simulations and games, and these reports are available to
+federal, state and local users of our Secure Portal.
+ The real value of exercises--and a difficult challenge--is in the
+identification and correction of weaknesses in our performance. We have
+established a national network of Lessons Learned and Best Practices
+for emergency response providers and homeland security officials. This
+``Lessons Learned Information Sharing'' system was developed by our
+partners at the Oklahoma Memorial Institute for the Prevention of
+Terrorism, is hosted on our secure but unclassified web portal, and is
+designed to share information necessary to prevent and respond to acts
+of terrorism across all disciplines and communities throughout the
+United States. All users are verified emergency response providers and
+homeland security officials at the local, state, and federal levels. We
+employ strong encryption and active site monitoring to protect all
+information housed on the system. Most importantly, the content is
+validated by homeland security professionals for their peers. The site
+also houses an extensive catalog of after-action reports from exercises
+and actual incidents as well as an updated list of homeland security
+exercises, events, and conferences.
+ Today's multimedia presentation will complete the portrait of the
+homeland security community's exercise efforts at every level of
+government--efforts that improve with every exercise. Your committee's
+support of these programs contributes to our readiness every day across
+this great nation.
+ In closing, I'd like to offer a premier illustration of the value
+of exercises to our nation's preparedness. In 1997, New York City began
+a rigorous series of exercises focused on the terrorist threat. Our
+office, along with other federal partners, was privileged to assist in
+these efforts. On the morning of September 11th, 2001, one of our
+exercise teams was in New York City preparing to assist Mayor Guiliani
+and his team in conduct of a full-scale bioterrorism exercise scheduled
+for September 12th. This exercise would have involved upwards of 700
+police officers and firefighters. The exercise venue, Pier 92, became
+the alternate City emergency operations center when Tower 7 of the
+Trade Center was made untenable by the attack. Mayor Guiliani later
+described what a robust exercise program meant to the City: ``We did
+not anticipate that airliners would be commandeered and turned into
+guided missiles; but the fact that we practiced for other kinds of
+disasters made us far more prepared to handle a catastrophe that nobody
+envisioned.''
+ Let me re-state Secretary Ridge's and my commitment to exercises as
+a cornerstone of America's homeland security preparedness. There are no
+stronger proponents than the President and the Secretary for the
+utility and versatility of exercises in improving domestic incident
+management. This concludes my statement. I will be happy to respond to
+any questions that you and the members of the Committee may have
+following our multimedia presentation. Thank you.
+ [Chart follows:]
+ [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] 24773.001
+
+ [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] 24773.002
+
+ [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] 24773.003
+
+ [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] 24773.004
+
+ [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] 24773.005
+
+
+ Chairman Cox. I want at this point to welcome and introduce
+also Mr. Clark Gruber, who is--or, pardon me, Corey Gruber.
+Clark, I am getting you confused here--Corey Gruber, who is the
+Associate Director of the Office for Domestic Preparedness at
+the Department of Homeland Security. We understand that you are
+not going to present formal testimony but would be pleased to
+respond to members' questions.
+ At this time, I would like to introduce Clark Kimerer, who
+is the Deputy Chief of Operations for the Seattle Police
+Department.
+
+ STATEMENT OF CLARK S. KIMERER
+
+ Mr. Kimerer. Mr. Chairman, distinguished members of the
+select committee on Homeland Security, thank you for inviting
+me to speak with you today. Washington State is proud to have
+two Congress people serving on this important committee,
+Congresswoman Jennifer Dunn and Congressman Norm Dicks. We
+appreciate your continued support to look after the Homeland
+Security needs of the City of Seattle and of the State of
+Washington.
+ It is an honor for me to be asked to share with you my
+reflections on the TOPOFF exercise series. It is particularly
+gratifying to note your commendable interest in the
+observations of a local police professional. We must never lose
+sight of the fact that, for most Americans, their homeland is
+defined as the specific geography where they live and work,
+raise their kids, go to school and enjoy their friends, their
+family and their leisure.
+ On May 12 of last year, the City of Seattle was rocked by a
+detonation of a radiological dispersal device, otherwise known
+as a dirty bomb, exploded by international terrorist
+operatives, creating a mass casualty crisis. For the whole of
+this 36-hour continuous crisis, City of Seattle Mayor Greg
+Nickels, Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske, the Fire Chief, and the
+head of public health presided over the City's Emergency
+Operations Center and provided continuous communication and
+engagement with the citizens of Seattle via the media. The
+entire architecture of the Federal response under the
+Department of Homeland Security was shoulder to shoulder with
+us during this event.
+ Of course, what I have just recounted was the
+congressionally conceived TOPOFF 2 exercise. No one was
+actually hurt or killed, the terrorist cell did not actually
+penetrate our defenses and harm our citizens, and at the
+conclusion of the exercise we went about the invaluable
+enterprise of analysis and improvement, rather than the tragic
+activity of mourning.
+ My observations today about TOPOFF 2 will be decidedly
+local and influenced by police officer sensibility. If asked to
+characterize my perspective, I will describe it as coming from
+the lofty vantage of being at ground level.
+ Why was this exercise so important and, in my estimation,
+so successful? Its value for me is measured in four basic
+dimensions.
+ First, an exercise tests and contributes to the evolution
+of doctrine, policies and plans. It is one thing to develop
+plans and policies as a matter of academic abstraction. It is
+quite another to test them in the real world, take real time
+movements of people on the ground. When all of this is set in
+motion, our doctrines and policies will be thoroughly tested
+and, as a consequence, will grow in clarity and precision. The
+TOPOFF 2 exercise series helped illuminate these critical
+needs, and together we have worked diligently to address them.
+ The Department of Homeland Security's recent work on the
+National Incident Management System, or NIMS, is right on point
+to address the major deficiencies we identified in TOPOFF 2.
+But I want to emphasize again that we are only as good as we
+are clear and precise in our doctrines and policies, and
+exercises help us attain that clarity and precision.
+ Second, an exercise provides an opportunity for the
+practical development of technical skills and expertise. Every
+one of the officers, firefighters, emergency room nurses and
+doctors, public health workers and the myriad others who were
+deployed during TOPOFF 2 gained real-world experience and
+practice in dealing with a crisis whose reach exceeded our
+grasp. This included real-world fatigue, real-world mandates to
+be innovative and creative, real-world mistakes. This is the
+gold standard of exercises. But we could not have undertaken it
+were it not for the financial support that enabled us to stage
+this exercise.
+ We have day jobs, 850,000 calls a year. We cannot take
+officers off the street to train them. It has to be off duty.
+So for us the TOPOFF series and, more to the point I am going
+to make next, the UASI grant process is invaluable. It is truly
+a Godsend.
+ I want to comment on UASI at this juncture. My observation
+is very straightforward. The UASI grant process has been vital
+to our jurisdictions, our local, state and regional
+jurisdictions. Without UASI support, cities like Seattle would
+be literally unable to equip, train and provide technological
+support to our first responders.
+ But we are approaching a point in the evolution of the UASI
+process where the limitations and prohibition regarding the
+hiring of full-time equivalents or personnel is becoming a
+critical priority of many chiefs. You see, in addition to
+technology, equipment and training, the capital and commodity
+we need most is people. We need to have the flexibility to
+invest in the most important capital asset of all, namely
+personnel.
+ Third, exercises in general and TOPOFF in particular
+provide--indeed require--a comprehensive after action
+assessment and evaluation process and report. This transforms
+our localized experience into an enduring, relevant and
+universal benefit that we can share among all of our first
+responder agencies at all levels of government. The Department
+of Homeland Security--and my friend, Corey Gruber--calls this
+``bankable learning.''
+ I propose that the key planners and players responsible for
+our exercises should have the chance to regularly convene with
+the exercise evaluators and assessors in an attempt to measure
+the growth of policy and strategy and in turn contribute to the
+national discussion and our collective expertise to prevent and
+respond to acts of terror.
+ Fourth, finally, and most important, an exercise like
+TOPOFF builds relationships and creates lines of communication.
+Our discussions around TOPOFF were candid, honest, open and
+productive. Now I know who to call, and the voice in
+Washington, D.C., is likely someone with whom I have
+established a professional relationship and vice versa. In my
+view, this is one of the most profound benefits of committing
+to any multijurisdictional exercise and TOPOFF 2 specifically.
+ I will close with one final thought. I contend that for any
+of these programs and initiatives to be successful they need to
+be designed and managed in large measure by the State and local
+first responders and active law enforcement, fire and police
+professionals who will use them. It is tempting but I believe
+misguided to look inside the Beltway for decisions that affect
+Seattle or Austin or Miami. Secretary Ridge, I know, shares
+this value. We are on track to make it a reality. But people
+like me need to constantly remind those that have much too much
+work to do of the importance of the local perspective in the
+design of our national strategy for response.
+ It has been an honor and a privilege for me to be able to
+share these observations with the committee. We are all part of
+the same coalition of concern and dedication, and together I
+know we will protect the citizens we serve and the freedoms
+that define our Nation. Thank you.
+ Chairman Cox. Thank you, Chief Kimerer.
+ [The statement of Mr. Kimerer follows:]
+
+ Prepared Statement of Clark S. Kimerer
+
+ Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Turner, Distinguished Members of the
+Select Committee on Homeland Security, thank you for inviting me to
+speak with you today. Washington State is proud to have two members
+serving on this important committee--Congresswoman Jennifer Dunn and
+Congressman Norm Dicks. We appreciate their continued attention to the
+homeland security needs of the City of Seattle and the residents of the
+State of Washington.
+ On May 12th of last year, the City of Seattle was rocked by the
+detonation of a radiological dispersal device, otherwise known as a
+``dirty bomb'', exploded by international terrorist operatives,
+creating a mass casualty situation, a plume of radioactive debris
+enshrouding a significant part of Seattle's civic center, and the
+contamination of police and firefighters who, with willful disregard
+for their own safety, rushed into this scene of destruction to care for
+the injured. For the next 36 hours, over 3700 men and women from
+Seattle, King County, the State of Washington, the Department of
+Homeland Security, the FBI, FEMA, the nation of Canada, local and
+national departments of public health, the academic community, and many
+others--including our partners from the private sector--worked together
+to contain and neutralize the damage; rescue, triage, decontaminate and
+treat victims; investigate the crime scene; and reassure a shaken
+public that we were doing everything possible to protect their sacred
+interests: Their own security and safety, that of their children and
+loved ones, and--at the same time--the freedoms that define this
+nation.
+ For the whole of this 36-hour crisis, City of Seattle Mayor Greg
+Nickels presided over the city's Emergency Operations Center, and
+provided continuous communication and engagement with the citizens of
+Seattle via the media. The Chief of Police, the Fire Chief, the
+Director of Public Health, the Director of FEMA Region 10, and the
+Department of Homeland Security Principal Federal Official (PFO), among
+others, worked in support of the Mayor to address the crisis. At the
+same time, nearly identical scenarios were being played out in the
+office of the King County Executive, and in the office of the Governor
+of the State of Washington. In Vancouver, British Columbia and the
+capital city of Ottawa, top officials from Canada worked to both
+protect the interests of their citizens, as well as offer assistance to
+the US. Then, in the midst of our crisis, a second attack was launched.
+Twenty-four hours into our response to the explosion in Seattle, the
+same terrorist group released tpneumonic plague bacillus in Illinois,
+infecting citizens in Chicago and its five surrounding counties. As in
+Seattle, the Mayor of Chicago, the executives of the impacted counties,
+the Governor of the State of Illinois, and the Department of Homeland
+Security worked together to address the crisis unfolding before them.
+And, finally, here in the other Washington, the response and support
+architecture of the Federal government, under the organizational
+structure of the Department of Homeland Security, was engaged and
+operational during the whole of the Seattle and Illinois crises. I have
+it on good authority that the Secretary got about as much sleep as the
+rest of us during the second week of May, 2003.
+ Of course, what I have just recounted was the congressionally
+conceived TOPOFF 2 exercise. No one was actually hurt or killed. The
+terrorist cell did not actually penetrate our defenses and harm our
+citizens. And at the conclusion of the exercise, we went about the
+invaluable enterprise of analysis and improvement, rather than the
+tragic activity of mourning.
+ It is an honor and privilege to be asked to share with you my
+reflections on the TOPOFF exercise series, as well as the value of
+exercising terrorism scenarios generally. It is particularly gratifying
+to note your commendable interest in the analysis and observations of
+local police, fire and emergency services professionals. I know this
+commitment is shared as a priority by the Secretary. We are, after all,
+the first responders to virtually every disaster and emergency either
+presented by nature, or conceived by the malignant misuse of the human
+intellect. The impressive machine of Federal support almost invariably
+follows the efforts of local, regional and state response. Local
+police, fire, public health and emergency services workers are and
+always will remain the first to respond and the last to leave. We do
+not have a national police force, like Canada, nor even a unified,
+governing jurisdictional construct like Great Britain. Our nation
+defines itself by local, community-based governance, particularly as
+concerns police and emergency services. In times of crisis, our
+citizens look for aid and reassurance from the President and Congress,
+and at the same time, to their elected Mayor, local police and fire
+chiefs, County Executive, and Governor. As we design exercises to
+improve our capacity to respond to terrorism, as we develop and refine
+homeland security doctrine to define essential responses and actions,
+we must never lose sight of the fact that most Americans define their
+``homeland'' as--first and foremost--the specific geography where they
+live and work, raise their kids, go to school, and enjoy their friends,
+family and leisure.
+ The balance of my comments will be my reflections on key lessons
+learned from TOPOFF 2; the profound value of exercises generally, both
+large and small; and, finally, what we need to build on based upon the
+insights gleaned from TOPOFF and other recent scenarios and
+simulations. I will also explore with you two related issues of great
+concern to my colleagues in the Major Cities, namely the need to have
+the latitude to hire personnel, and to keep focused upon threat-based
+assessments at the municipal and regional first responder level. My
+observations will be decidedly local and influenced by a police
+officer's sensibility. If asked to characterize my perspective, I would
+describe it as ``low altitude,'' or--more to the point--generated from
+the lofty vantage of being at ground level.
+ Perhaps the most immediate and significant characteristic of the
+TOPOFF 2 exercise is symbolized by its very name: TOPOFF, which is
+shorthand for Top Officials. A few moments ago, I described that during
+the TOPOFF field exercise in May 2003, we saw the total engagement and
+focused participation of Seattle Mayor Nickels, the King County
+Executive, Washington Governor Locke, Mayor Daley, the elected
+Executives representing five counties surrounding Chicago, the Governor
+of Illinois, top officials in Canada, Secretary Ridge and the whole of
+the leadership of DHS, members of the Cabinet, and the office of the
+President himself. I know that members of Congress, and this committee
+in particular, were part of this unparalleled coalition of engagement
+and concern. This level of exercise play was truly groundbreaking, both
+as an opportunity for evaluation and assessment of our gaps and needs,
+as well as for its statement of the commitment we have made to the war
+against terrorism.
+ Why was this exercise so important and, in my estimation, so
+successful? I contend that exercises of any scale--from the monumental,
+like TOPOFF 2 and the upcoming TOPOFF 3, to the focused and specific,
+like a 4-hour tabletop scenario--are immensely valuable. Their value is
+measured in four basic dimensions:
+ First, an exercise tests and contributes to the evolution of
+doctrine, policies and plans. It is one thing to develop a vision of
+crisis and consequence management as a matter of academic abstraction;
+it is quite another to test doctrine and policies in real world, real
+time movement of people on the ground. Every time we individually or
+nationally undertake a field exercise, we have an opportunity to re-
+think and further clarify our basic principles. What is the role of a
+national alert system? What is the priority of the Incident Command
+System for first responders? Where do jurisdictions begin and end? What
+is the role of the private sector and business community in both crisis
+and consequence management? How do we organize joint public
+information, crisis communications, and who is the messenger? Who
+leads, who follows, who facilitates? During TOPOFF 2, over eight
+hundred Seattle firefighters and police officers moved on the ground
+for 36 continuous hours to rescue the injured, evaluate and contain the
+damage, extricate victims from collapsed structures, implement Incident
+Command, establish interoperable communications, investigate the crime,
+reassure the public, coordinate the integration of local, state and
+federal emergency services leaders; when all of this is set in motion,
+our doctrines and policies will be thoroughly tested, and, as a
+consequence, will grow in clarity and evolve in precision.
+ In TOPOFF 2, it became clear that we have more work to do to
+further clarify our national, state and local doctrines. From my
+perspective, we need to use exercises like TOPOFF 2 to unify first
+responders in applying the Incident Command System, or ICS.
+ We need to clearly articulate our focus upon local, regional and
+state capacities, based upon threat assessment, population densities,
+and critical infrastructure. We need to practice the integration of
+mutual aid, and the arrival of federal support and coordination into
+field command and command post operations. We need to have a precise
+and efficient organization for public information, joint crisis
+communications, with due regard for the jurisdictional responsibilities
+of the elected leaders of impacted communities.
+ The TOPOFF 2 exercise helped illuminate these critical needs, and
+together we have worked diligently to address them. The Department of
+Homeland Security's work on the National Incident Management System (or
+NIMS), the Homeland Security Exercise and Evaluation Program (HSEEP),
+HSPD 5 and 8, the National Response Plan, and the recent Universal Task
+List work group that I sit on, are right on point to address the gaps
+and needs illuminated by TOPOFF 2. And in TOPOFF 3, all of these
+lessons learned have been integrated into the design of the next set of
+scenarios. I have the privilege of being one of the TOPOFF 3 mentors,
+and am solidly impressed by the design of the upcoming exercise series.
+But I want to emphasize that we are only as good as we are clear and
+precise in doctrine and policy, and we must create a sustainable
+process of learning to hone and refine our doctrinal principles and
+priorities. I believe that Aristotle captured this mandate: If you
+really know something, you can say it, and say it clearly and
+precisely. Exercises immensely help us to this end.
+ Second, an exercise provides and opportunity for the practical
+development of technical skills and expertise. In some ways, this is
+self-evident. Every one of the officers, firefighters, emergency room
+nurses and doctors, public health workers, ambulance technicians,
+utility and public works professionals, and the myriad others deployed
+during TOPOFF 2 gained real world experience and practice in dealing
+with a crisis whose reach exceeded our grasp. This included real world
+fatigue, real world mandates to be flexible and innovative, and real
+world mistakes. Many of the TOPOFF 2 participants in Seattle were at
+the beginning of 20--and 30-year careers. Imagine a long tenure in
+emergency services marked by progressively more difficult and complex
+exposure to scenarios, played out in times of calm, and with the
+opportunity for reflection and improvement. This is our gold standard.
+But it is near impossible for most municipal, county or state fire or
+police agencies--including Seattle--to undertake a major exercise and
+meets its day-to-day requirements for emergency response. Were it not
+for the financial support we received to stage TOPOFF 2, we could not
+have taken resources away from the street and 911 responsibilities.
+Consider this: In Seattle last year, the police department responded to
+850,000 911 calls. A quarter million of these calls required one, two
+or multiple police officers to physically respond. On top of that,
+these same police officers self-initiated stops, arrests or other
+official actions 170,000 times. Over 20,000 adults and juveniles were
+arrested and booked into jail, and another 6500 were cited or summoned.
+On the one hand, it is precisely this day-to-day experience that makes
+the local jurisdictions expert in first response and emergency
+management. We do it all the time. What better resource to help define
+the national doctrine, strategy and exercise plan. But on the other
+hand, it is precisely this burden of work that precludes us from being
+able to create a TOPOFF 2 on our own. When we train, it is almost
+always during off-duty times, resulting in overtime and other
+exceptional financial and personnel impacts. But, in the view of this
+operations chief and 20-year veteran of policing, it is worth every
+penny.
+ It is appropriate at this juncture to comment on the UASI grant
+process. My observation is very straightforward. The UASI grant process
+has been vital. Without UASI support, cities like Seattle would have
+unable to equip, train and provide technological support to our first
+responders. It would have taken us ten years to approach a percentage
+of the progress we have made under UASI in just the last 12 months.
+This progress has all been in areas directly supportive of our mission
+to prevent, detect, deter and mitigate acts of terrorism, specifically
+personal protective and detection equipment, maritime, port and
+transportation protection, interoperable communications, and other
+programs that protect our citizens. We are fast approaching a point in
+the evolution of the UASI process that many chiefs and elected
+officials around the county are confronting:
+ The limitations and prohibitions on hiring FTEs from grant sources
+like UASI is becoming a priority concern, for this reason: In addition
+to technology equipment and training, the capital and commodity we are
+most in need of is people. Expert, dedicated, competent people to
+assist us in planning, intelligence, technical and scientific
+processes, computer and communications technology--including the
+emerging threat of cyber terrorism--and, quite simply, to help us
+manage the equipment and systems we are receiving from the UASI
+process. We know the difficulties that inhere in grant funding
+personnel positions. We know that creating an on-going obligation for
+staff beyond the life of a grant is problematic. But I am confident
+that there is a middle ground, and that we can structure positions that
+have set terms and sunset provisions to meet our need to have the
+flexibility to invest in the most important capital asset of all,
+namely personnel.
+ Third, exercises in general and TOPOFF in particular provide--
+indeed, require--a comprehensive after action assessment and evaluation
+process and report. We call these ``lessons learned,'' and, in a real
+sense, this process may be the reason to undertake an exercise in the
+first place. As I mentioned above, TOPOFF 2 provided an opportunity to
+test and refine our doctrines and policies, and explore real world,
+practical deployments with our regional, state and federal partners as
+we jointly confronted a series of devastating terrorist attacks. But
+what transforms our localized experience into an enduring, relevant and
+universal benefit is the sharing of our insights in a sustainable and
+secure system that can be accessed by all police, fire and emergency
+services professionals. The Department of Homeland Security has called
+this ``bankable learning.'' The process of integrating the architecture
+of data collection, evaluation and assessment and sharing of lessons
+learned must begin at the same time an exercise is conceived. This did
+not happen in TOPOFF 2; it is a principle component of TOPOFF 3. I
+commend DHS for their resolve to take this key element of exercise
+management and elevating its priority for future scenarios. In the end,
+this is the basic reason to commit to the expense, risk and personnel
+impacts of an exercise at all: To grow, improve, evolve and share
+insights to benefit all emergency workers, in the same manner that a
+rising tide lifts all boats.
+ For my part, I believe we have more work to do in evaluating the
+TOPOFF 2 experience. I would like to see an after action process that
+regularly revisits and provides opportunity for thoroughgoing follow-up
+on the lessons we learned. One year, two years, even five years
+following an exercise like TOPOFF should be the occasions to
+systematically compare our insights against changes in policy,
+doctrine, first response, consequence management, and training. The key
+leaders and planners responsible for an exercise should have the chance
+to convene with the exercise evaluators and assessors, in an attempt to
+measure the growth of policy and strategy, and in turn, contribute to
+the national discussion and our collective expertise to prevent and
+respond to acts of terror and disasters generally. This is truly
+``bankable learning,'' and is a priority I know we share with the
+Department of Homeland Security.
+ Fourth, finally, and most important, an exercise like TOPOFF builds
+relationships and creates lines of communication. In the end, it really
+is all about relationships. In the year leading up to the Full Field
+Exercise, I participated in a series of TOPOFF seminars that explored
+public information, direction and control, management of an RDD and
+plague attack, jurisdictional responsibilities and prerogatives; in
+short, the whole gamut of response challenges that will be present in
+the event of a real attack. These discussions were candid, honest, open
+and productive. The Department of Homeland Security heard from me and
+my colleagues that we will be successful in direct proportion to the
+level that local first responders are consulted and listened to; and I
+heard and saw that DHS was comprised of smart, dedicated people who
+were trying their best to address a huge task in a short time to thwart
+an implacable and malignant adversary (and listen to state and local
+jurisdictions at the same time) I remain impressed. I commend their
+efforts. And now, I know who to call, and the voice in Washington DC is
+likely someone with whom I have established a professional
+relationship. And vice versa. The exact dimensions of how important it
+is to create these relationships is difficult to quantify. In my view,
+this is one of the most profound benefits of committing to any multi-
+jurisdictional exercise, and TOPOFF 2 specifically.
+ Now, during the exercise itself, it wasn't always perfect. There
+were not a few false starts, though none that interfered with the work
+being done in the field. I found that the Principal Federal Official
+(PFO) system worked very well, and I was surprised and gratified to see
+a minimum of ``creeping jurisdictions'' at play. In the end, I believe
+that DHS was eminently respectful of the role of local government and
+its first responders, and tailored its role to support, assist, engage
+the federal system and its myriad responsibilities, and prepare for
+transitions of jurisdiction following the resolution of the mass
+casualty incident by Seattle police, fire and emergency services
+professionals.
+ As we look ahead, I can conceptualize a roadmap based in part upon
+my previous comments. The first element is the continued support of
+exercises and scenarios at the federal, state and local level, with
+emphasis on interjurisdictional coordination and mutual aid. A
+progressive continuum of exercise formats and media--from elementary to
+highly advanced--should be our ultimate goal. The Department of
+Homeland Security is pursuing this objective with rigor and energy.
+Programs involving distance learning, computer-aided models,
+simulations and games, formats for tabletop, limited and full field
+exercises and specialized scenarios and topics--cyber terrorism being
+one example--would find a ready audience. At the heart of this
+curriculum, I believe, must be use of the incident command system. Now,
+returning to a central theme of my remarks, I contend that for any of
+these programs to be truly successful, they need to be designed and
+managed in large measure by the state and local first responders and
+active law enforcement and fire professionals who will use them. The
+second element, then, is a redoubled commitment to ensure that
+doctrine, policy and exercise design is a matter for state and local
+input and expertise. It is tempting to look inside the beltway for
+decisions that affect Seattle or Austin or Des Moines. Having said
+this, I know that the Secretary is committed to a full partnership with
+the many state and local experts who make up the first responder
+community. The third element is an expanded program of after-action
+analysis, appropriately secured but accessible to all professionals
+within the federal, state and local emergency response community. This
+program should include regular updates and opportunities for
+interaction with evaluators and assessors, and should ideally be
+presented in a standard format designed by the professionals who will
+use the information. The fourth element is to maximize the occasions
+for interaction at all levels, and to build relationships and lines of
+communication forged in times of calm, that will endure in times of
+crisis.
+ It is an honor and a privilege for me to be able to share these
+observations with the committee. We are all a part of the same
+coalition of concern and dedication, and together I know that we will
+protect the citizens we serve, and the freedoms that define our nation
+
+ Chairman Cox. Of course, whereas Seattle had to endure a
+radiological attack, the Chicago metropolitan area had to
+endure an attack of bubonic plague; and here to tell us about
+that is Tom Mefferd, who is the Director of the DuPage County
+Office of Homeland Security in the Chicago, Illinois, area.
+Welcome.
+
+ STATEMENT OF THOMAS O. MEFFERD
+
+ Mr. Mefferd. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the
+committee. I appreciate the opportunity to discuss exercise
+issues with you as related to the TOPOFF exercise.
+ As has been previously indicated, the State of Illinois and
+the State of Washington, the whole country, if you will,
+participated in the exercises a little over a year ago. While
+it would be real easy to spend some time talking in detail
+about that exercise, I would like to take a step backwards and
+talk about the whole picture that exercise plays or that
+exercising plays in the grander scale of emergency
+preparedness. Preparedness is one of the major functions that
+homeland security and emergency management is built on.
+ There is a three-part process, a triangle, if you will, of
+planning, training and exercising; and each of those pieces
+have been mentioned in one way or the other here this
+afternoon. Planning is the foundation under which the whole
+process is built. Planning is the foundation, if you will, that
+allows us to be able to respond to a major emergency or
+disaster. Absent an emergency plan, we have nothing to train to
+and we have nothing to exercise, because we have not thought
+out who is going to do what at what level and how we are going
+to do it. It is critical that an emergency plan exist at the
+local level, at the State level and at the Federal regional
+level, as well as the headquarters level, that clearly
+indicates how we work together.
+ There were numerous things that came up in the TOPOFF
+exercise that either required a decision to be made at a local
+level that directly impacted things that were happening here in
+Washington, or there was a decision made here in Washington
+that directly impacted things that happened at the local level.
+We must be able to understand, we must be able to know how our
+counterparts are functioning and thinking at every level of
+government, because as we continue to function in an emergency
+scenario we must work as a team.
+ The development of the national response plan and,
+ultimately, NIMS will help us do that. But I caution you, just
+putting a document on the street will not solve the problem.
+The ultimate solution to this problem is the adoption, the
+training and the acceptance on the part of every State and
+every one of our localities of those systems. We must work
+together. We must work in unison if we are going to be able to
+function.
+ As we look at the TOPOFF scenario and ultimately any
+terrorist incidents, it is critical again that we have a system
+that is robust, that we have a system that is clearly
+understood at every level of government; and that leads to the
+second part of the triangle, training. As part of TOPOFF, prior
+to the exercises, there was over a year of planning and
+training activities that led us to, ultimately, the skills
+necessary to perform the exercise. That training where we
+brought together local officials and county officials and State
+officials and Federal officials was invaluable.
+ Again, it is critical that we all clearly understand how we
+relate to each other. Every person, every agency that has a
+role in the ultimate emergency plan must also participate in
+training if in fact we are to work as a team. Again, as a
+sports team, as any other team works, we must do the same in
+homeland security and emergency management.
+ Finally, the third leg of that triangle, exercising. There
+are some basic concepts that I think we forget sometimes in the
+development of exercise, and that is the concept that we must
+crawl before we walk and we must walk before we run.
+ In the same fashion, we look at exercising as 80 percent
+training and 20 percent testing. It is important that we
+understand clearly that when we go through an exercise, as we
+did in TOPOFF, that we will make mistakes, that we will
+identify those mistakes and work to solve the problems that
+were identified in the exercise. It is critical that we clearly
+understand that we don't rush out and just do the big
+phenomenal exercise but we also support all of the smaller
+exercises that led up to that. We did, I believe a total of six
+exercises in preparation for the ultimate TOPOFF exercise.
+ Additionally, one of the fallacies in exercise design that
+I think we should be aware of is that we should not be afraid
+to make those mistakes. Understandably, if exercises are going
+to be a training environment, we are going to make mistakes
+that may potentially be made public. But those mistakes can be
+fixed through critique. They can be fixed through evaluation
+and planning and retraining.
+ There are a number of other specifics, but let me move
+toward conclusion, to touch base on one final component, a
+critical component of the system, as Clark just indicated, with
+the UASI program. That part is personnel. It is critical that,
+as we look at the management infrastructure in this country
+that is responsible to make sure that we have the capability to
+respond not only to an exercise but a full-scale disaster, we
+have to start looking at other areas other than our first
+responders.
+ Don't take that wrong. Our first responders have been
+focused as a major part of national attention since September
+11, and they need that continued support. We need to make sure
+our first responders are the best trained, best equipped and
+best prepared. But the issue is there needs to be the command
+and control system that stands behind those first responders
+that is prepared to make the decisions that are necessary.
+ The emergency management community, the emergency managers
+themselves, our chief executive officers need to be trained.
+They need to be exercised, and they need to be supported. Our
+infrastructure in communications and interoperability and
+command and control facilities, emergency operating centers
+must be a priority.
+ Again, as we look at the support systems for our personnel
+we need to clearly understand in the preparation for TOPOFF
+this was a year-plus activity that put significant strains on
+those agencies that participated. In our government alone, we
+had three full-time personnel, two in our public health
+community, one in my office, that initially were committed on a
+monthly basis to multiday meetings once a month. As we moved
+closer to the exercise, that was almost a full-time commitment.
+If an exercise can put that kind of a strain on a local
+government system, then what would a real emergency do? We need
+the availability of putting additional personnel into our
+command and control system, much as Clark has just indicated.
+ In conclusion, again, let me state this. As we look at
+exercises, the benefit to our country, the benefit to our
+communities is immeasurable. Bringing folks together, talking
+together, planning together and working together, there is no
+way to measure that. It is a tremendous benefit.
+ But again we must--we must from the Federal level down have
+a commitment to support the overall triangle--planning,
+training and exercising--as an entire package. The continued
+support of Congress, the continued support of the Department of
+Homeland Security is essential to all of us at the local level
+being able to effectively respond and manage a major crisis,
+especially the uniqueness that is there from a terrorism
+scenario. Thank you very much.
+ Chairman Cox. Mr. Mefferd, thank you very much for your
+testimony.
+ [The statement of Mr. Mefferd follows:]
+
+ Prepared Statement of Thomas O. Mefferd
+
+ By way of background, I have been involved in the emergency
+management field since 1971, serving at the municipal, township and
+county government levels. Additionally, I have served in the training
+and education divisions of both state and federal governments. During
+these thirty- three years, I have participated in or developed more
+than 100 exercises ranging from low-level table-top exercises to full-
+scale exercises.
+ A little more than one year ago the State of Illinois; City of
+Chicago and its surrounding counties of Cook, DuPage, Kane, and Lake;
+the State of Washington; City of Seattle and surrounding counties; and
+the federal governments of the United States and Canada participated in
+the most extensive counter-terrorism exercise ever held in this
+country. This exercise was designed to test the cooperative efforts of
+the local, state, and federal government in responding to, and
+ultimately recovering from, a multi-facetted terrorist attack on the
+country.
+ At the outset it may appear appropriate to comment on and critique
+the exercise and its ultimate results. However, it is critical to
+clearly understand the role that exercising plays in the bigger picture
+of emergency preparedness. Preparedness includes three equal but
+interrelated components, including:
+ Planning
+ Training
+ Exercising
+ Planning is the foundation on which the triangle rests. Absent an
+emergency plan, there is nothing on which to train and no organization
+to exercise. The key to an effective response and recovery system is
+the development of a comprehensive emergency plan that clearly
+identifies the roles and responsibilities of key departments, agencies,
+and officials, and various levels of government. More importantly, the
+roles, responsibilities, and authorities of all agencies that
+participate must be clearly defined. At the local level, where a mayor
+or county executive provides direct leadership to operating
+departments, the process of ``direction and control'' is relatively
+easy. The higher one looks in government, however, the more convoluted
+things become. With the large number of federal agencies, as well as
+the differences between regional and headquarters organizations, it is
+not always clear how certain decisions are made and how local
+implementation of those decisions occur.
+ With the roll out of the new National Response Plan (NRP) and the
+National Incident Management System (NIMS), hopefully many gray areas
+will be eliminated. Critical, however, to the success of these plans
+will be their adoption and integration at the local and state levels.
+ The following example, related to the Strategic National Stockpile,
+clearly illustrates how planning must be integrated at all levels of
+government.
+ A terrorist organization covertly releases a biological agent
+ into a community. In a short period of time many citizens
+ become ill and begin to seek medical attention. At the local
+ level, emergency medical services (EMS) providers and health
+ care professionals attempt to render aid. Reporting
+ requirements at the local level alert county health officials
+ who realize that something is terribly wrong. Calls are placed
+ to state health officials who, in cooperation with county
+ officials begin medical surveillance. Notification of the
+ Centers for Disease Control follows. Working jointly, local,
+ state, and federal officials determine that a biological agent
+ has been released which requires the deployment of the
+ Strategic National Stockpile (SNS). CDC officials transport the
+ nearest push-pack to the state, who in turn receives the
+ package and distributes it to the stricken county. County and
+ municipal officials open medication dispensing sites and
+ provide prophylaxis to exposed individuals and are able to deal
+ with the crisis.
+ Clearly this scenario identifies separate but interrelated roles
+for municipal, county, state, and federal governments. If any of these
+component pieces do not understand their role then other related
+components do not function, potentially leading to a loss of life, or
+at least significant levels of confusion. While this scenario focuses
+only on public health, consider the ramifications when areas of crisis
+communications, law enforcement investigations, and consequence
+management issues are added.
+ The second but equally important part of the triangle is training.
+Once a plan or procedure has been developed, it is critical that
+everyone who will use the plan be instructed in how that plan is to
+function. This includes personnel at all levels of government. As can
+clearly be seen in the example above, there are key roles as well as
+major opportunities for failure at all levels of government. It is
+clear, then, that officials at every level of government clearly
+understand their role as well as those who function at levels both
+above and below them.
+ The final part of the triangle is exercising. A mistake often made
+by exercise planners is that a full-scale exercise is the best way to
+test a plan or procedure. A guiding premise to exercise design is that
+you must be able to crawl before you walk, and walk before you run.
+Additionally, exercises can be viewed as 80% training and 20% testing.
+Therefore, lower level table-top and functional exercises should be a
+key part in any exercise program, where participants can ``walk
+through'' procedures and become trained in the proper method of dealing
+with an event. During the TOPOFF program, several lower level exercises
+were held to allow local, state, and federal agencies to work out the
+``bugs'' before tackling the final full-scale exercise. These types of
+multi-level exercises should continue and be expanded as a key
+component of any federal terrorism exercise program. On a daily basis,
+close coordination and cooperation is the exception not the rule.
+Working through problems and resolving issues as part of these
+exercises brings responders and policy makers together and fosters
+closer cooperation which ultimately leads to lives saved.
+ A common fault of exercise design, especially in high visibility
+exercises, is a desire to ``not look bad.'' In many exercises,
+important functions are left untested because a perceived weakness may
+be observed, reported on, and made public. Exercises, by their very
+nature, are designed as training tools. It is assumed, if not
+understood, that mistakes are made during training. Making a mistake
+during an exercise is natural and nothing to be ashamed of. During the
+critique process, problems are identified and potential solutions
+found. These problems are then remedied through future planning,
+training, and re-exercising. This cyclical process corrects weaknesses,
+focuses on prior successes, and ultimately builds a stronger system.
+ In retrospect, a number of lessons learned from the TOPOFF 2
+exercise should be shared for the benefit of those who will follow and
+to guide the development of future exercises. Highlights of these
+lessons include:
+ Limit the number of objectives that the exercise will
+ try and accomplish. Many departments and agencies often have a
+ shopping list of things that they want to test / try in an
+ exercise. The more complex the exercise becomes, the greater
+ the potential for failure or for participants to become
+ disillusioned. Exercise objectives should be realistic for the
+ type of scenario being developed.
+ The exercise can not be everything to everyone. As
+ stated above, not every agency may be able to participate in
+ every exercise. For example, in a biological scenario, collapse
+ search and rescue teams, or hazardous materials response teams
+ may not be needed. Again, participation in the exercise should
+ be realistic, based on the scenario being developed.
+ Coordinated multi-jurisdictional decision making must
+ be included. During TOPOFF a decision was made in Washington to
+ close O'Hare International Airport and suspend passenger rail
+ traffic in and out of Chicago, without consultation with the
+ City of Chicago, the State of Illinois, or the federal regional
+ agencies that were participating. This decision left local
+ governments scrambling on how to implement the decision, and
+ more importantly, how to re-start operations when the airport
+ and rail station were declared safe. This type of coordination
+ is essential during a real incident, and now is the time to
+ learn how to function.
+ Future exercises must focus on the weaknesses or
+ problem areas discovered in previous exercises. During TOPOFF 1
+ a number of problem areas were identified with the Strategic
+ National Stockpile. During TOPOFF 2 various federal, state, and
+ local agencies worked diligently to work through these issues
+ and develop procedures that would ensure effective operations.
+ Future exercises should continue to build on the lessons
+ learned so that new and better procedures can be developed.
+ Future exercises should allow continued exploration of
+ new and more effective ways to respond and recover. One
+ official from the Department of Homeland Security likened the
+ TOPOFF exercise to a laboratory. I cannot agree more. While the
+ exercise tests knowledge of plans and systems, it also provides
+ an opportunity to ``test'' new approaches and provides hands-on
+ training to acquaint emergency managers and responders.
+ Future exercises should explore recovery issues. In
+ most exercises, a test of the capability and capacity of
+ government and the private sector to effectively respond is
+ scripted. Exploration of the issues related to long term
+ recovery are often not a key focus. Response exercises often
+ become media events where government can visibly demonstrate
+ capabilities. Recovery activities, on the other hand, usually
+ take place in a command center, hidden from public view, where
+ decision making and prioritizing are the key. These activities
+ are not very photogenic and therefore don't tell ``the
+ preparedness story'' that government wants the public to see.
+ While life-saving skills must be constantly honed, it is
+ equally important that emergency managers work through the
+ problems associated with recovery.
+ Finally, it is important that we focus on a critical component,
+common to each of the three phases of preparedness previously
+described. The one common thread to all three phases is the individual
+charged with the responsibility for management of the community's
+preparedness program. This person is the local emergency manager. Since
+September 11, 2001, significant national attention has been given to
+the nation's first responders. Millions of dollars have been spent to
+provide our first responders with the latest in technology and life-
+saving equipment, as it should be. However, little or no money has been
+allocated to upgrading our aging command and control systems, emergency
+operating centers, and more importantly to increasing the support to
+the local officials who are charged with the responsibility for
+managing a major crisis.
+ In most communities, across the nation, the position of emergency
+manager is filled by a part-time or volunteer. Even in communities
+where a full time manager exists, staffing levels for this position are
+less than adequate to maintain an effective and robust crisis
+management capability. Preparing for the TOPOFF exercise required
+almost a year of planning and training. In the early phases of
+planning, monthly multi-day meetings occurred. As the date for the
+exercise drew closer, an almost full-time personnel commitment was
+required. In many communities the level of commitment needed to support
+an exercise of this magnitude would not be possible, even though the
+benefits from this type of exercise are enormous. If this level of
+stress is generated by an exercise, then what might be the impact on
+the emergency system created by an actual event?
+ In conclusion, the benefits to the nation and our citizens by
+participating in emergency exercises are immeasurable. Exercises allow
+first responders and emergency managers to understand the demands that
+may be placed on their community during a terrorist event or other
+disaster. For any exercise to be effective, however, requires a firm
+commitment to the other two components of the preparedness triangle,
+planning and training.
+ Continued support of the emergency preparedness program, as well as
+those who manage that program, by the Department of Homeland Security
+and members of Congress is essential to increasing the level of
+preparedness through the country.
+
+ Chairman Cox. Mr. Kimerer, Ms. Mencer, and Mr. Gruber,
+thank you for being here as a resource as we dive ahead into
+questions; and thank you for all the work that you all do in
+keeping our Nation safe.
+ One of the major questions that Congress is now wrestling
+with as we write legislation is whether or not funding
+terrorism preparedness is in some way different than funding
+preparedness for other hazards that can produce similar
+symptoms. For example, a building can blow up because of a
+natural gas leak. The casualties might be identical to those
+occasioned by an Oklahoma City bombing type attack on the same
+building. Is there a difference when you train in responding to
+terrorism that is manmade and in responding to either acts of
+nature or accidents?
+ It is possible, for example, that terrorists could use
+bioweapons. It is also possible that we could actually have an
+outbreak of plague which would be a public health emergency.
+Would there really be a difference in the way that we
+responded? We have varying views about this in Congress, and it
+influences how we put the money into the hands of first
+responders.
+ At this point, I want to share with you my own view, which
+is that there are differences and there are similarities, but
+from the standpoint of first responders we only have one first
+responder. We only have one Fire Department, we only have one
+Police Department, and they are not on duty 24/7 waiting for a
+terrorist incident. They are doing a lot of other work in the
+meanwhile. So they have to be prepared to deal with all
+hazards.
+ I don't think that is the argument. I think the question
+is, rather, back here in Washington, when we make funds
+available, should there be an additional pot of money available
+that is separate from all hazards money that goes directly to
+terrorism training? Because there are unique aspects of
+terrorism. And when I say training, I mean also terrorism
+preparedness in all of its manifestations, because there are
+differences.
+ Facially, it strikes me that there is a difference between
+a hurricane coming through town, which at least when it hits
+has predictable behavior, and the same kind of havoc being
+wreaked by human beings who not only can strike but who can
+plan avoidance in real time. This is a thinking threat, not an
+unreasoning one.
+ Likewise, as some of you mentioned in your prepared
+statements, you have to focus on different things when you are
+cleaning up after acts of terror. After the Madrid bombings, we
+wanted to make sure that we gained as much in the way of clues
+to the way terrorists operate as possible, so we went in not
+only to clean up the mess but also to find out exactly how this
+happened. There are chain of evidence and custody of evidence
+issues that law enforcement is, of course, well aware of when
+there is a thinking assault by a human being as against other
+kinds of disasters that at least symptomatically produce the
+same result.
+ If you could--and I would address this to all the panel--
+help us with this. Should Congress have separate funding
+available as an incremental addition to what we make available
+for all hazards?
+ Miss Mencer, we will begin with you.
+ Ms. Mencer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
+ I think you are absolutely right in your description. It is
+different when you respond to the scene of a terrorist event
+because, as you have described, you are entering into a crime
+scene. So you have to preserve the evidence there. You have to
+worry about intelligence collection, as well, so you can catch
+the people who did it. So it is very different than a hurricane
+or a tornado. So, yes, it has special requirements. It requires
+specialized exercises to deal with it, and specialized training
+and equipment. So that is absolutely correct.
+ And, Corey, would you like to add anything to that?
+ Mr. Gruber. Yes, ma'am.
+ Sir, the very important point that we are talking about is
+a human architect that is adaptive, versus historically what we
+face, which has been morally neutral nonadaptive hazards. When
+we face a human predator, we have the addition of prevention
+activities, deterrence and defeat of that adversary, and
+intelligence collection and gathering. So we believe that, if
+we take a capabilities-based and a scenario-based approach to
+planning for these events, we need to look across the full
+spectrum of the missions that we face as a department, or as a
+Homeland Security community, but we have to focus on the very
+most essential tasks.
+ And the Homeland Security Act, and the national strategy
+have told us that prevention is the foremost imperative. So we
+have very much focused our efforts on that significant
+difference from facing seasonal, geographic and nonadaptive
+hazards.
+ Chairman Cox. Chief Kimerer.
+ Mr. Kimerer. Mr. Chair, the fact is that there are great
+similarities and great and profound differences when looking at
+preparing for terrorism. As Mr. Gruber said, a terrorist act is
+the result of a malignant use of the intellect and has a level
+of aggression and deliberation and strategizing that makes it
+absolutely incomparable to other natural disasters. The fact
+that we do a lot of the same things, of course, is an argument
+for exercising and training and practicing. Implementing
+incident command is somewhat universal. Preparing for the next
+wave of attack or the next part of the stratagem makes the
+whole curricula of exercising for terrorism very unique and
+fairly new to local law enforcement. The consequence
+management, as was mentioned before, has profound implications.
+ Case in point, as part of our exercise we had our
+responders preparing for working through both the intelligence
+and the reality of there being a secondary explosion, of there
+being the discovery of a safe house, of things that were
+uncovered and disclosed in the crime scene that might have
+pointed to additional threats in other parts of our region or
+even other parts of the country, like Chicago. It is a unique
+body of wisdom that we need to be working toward in looking at
+and preparing for and responding to detecting and deterring a
+terrorist act.
+ Chairman Cox. Director Mefferd.
+ Mr. Mefferd. Let me build on the comments that have been
+made. I totally agree with your assessment of two roles. When
+we deal with a natural disaster, you are dealing with an event
+that has very clearly manifested itself. Typically, you will
+have one thing to worry about, and that is the disaster. When
+you are dealing with a terrorism event, one of the things you
+must think about is I, as a first responder, am a target; and
+one of the goals of a terrorist is to try to lure the first
+responder to that scene and now move into a second attack which
+now takes down the first responder.
+ But as we set that aside and look at some of the other
+issues, the evidence roles that have been brought up, one of
+the other critical roles today is we have to think about long-
+term public health effects. If we did have a release of a
+biological agent or a chemical agent, again, if we look at a
+typical disaster, we take an individual to the hospital. We
+treat them, we release them, and the whole process maybe takes
+a few days to a week. We are talking about potentially people
+who will be evolving into some kind of a disease or some kind
+of long-term problem months or year later. So records need to
+be kept, and systems need to be built to handle that. Long-term
+epidemiology processes need to be put in place.
+ If you will, we are used, in the law enforcement community,
+to work as detectives who look for clues for crime scenes.
+Today, we are looking at medical health professionals who are
+also becoming detectives to try and find out what was released,
+where was it released, how many people were exposed to that
+release.
+ And, finally, the whole issue of emergency public
+information. Again, in a tornado, it is real easy to say a
+tornado has gone through. This is where you come to get your
+assistance. This is the shelter area.
+ In a biological attack, for example, we have long-range and
+long-reaching public information and community-building types
+of things that we have to look at. How do we make the
+population aware of the fact that the event is over? Is it
+over? How do we make the community aware of the fact that this
+area is safe again? And how do we make--how do we clearly
+identify those issues?
+ So certainly there are some uniquenesses--some tremendous
+uniquenesses with the issue of terrorism response and recovery.
+ Chairman Cox. Thank you very much.
+ The Ranking Member, Mr. Turner, is recognized for
+questions.
+ Mr. Turner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
+ I would like to ask each of you to comment on this
+question. What level of preparedness standard are we working
+toward? And what experience comes out of these exercises that
+helps shed light on what that level of preparedness is? And
+perhaps even more importantly, I would like to have each of you
+tell us whether you think it is important for us to have a
+preparedness standard.
+ In the legislation that the Chairman and I have introduced,
+and this committee has reported out, we call for the
+establishment of what we call the essential capabilities of
+preparedness that we think should be established. But I would
+like your comments on whether or not this is an issue of
+importance that we should address.
+ Mr. Mefferd. That is a kind of a moving target. Certainly,
+a level of preparedness nationwide is something we should work
+towards. I think one of the problems that we see across the
+board--and I am going to go back to the personnel issue. As we
+look towards establishing a standard, we need to understand who
+is going to be responsible for attaining that standard across
+the country. The typical individual who serves as the emergency
+manager, the person responsible for building that capability
+for coordinating the planning, for bringing those pieces
+together in many cases is a part-time, if not a volunteer,
+individual. Should we then set that standard based on that? And
+I don't believe so.
+ I think we need a standard. We need to work towards an
+ultimate goal. As we look at standards in law enforcement, as
+we look at standards in the fire service, the challenges that
+we have to meet today are a moving target. But they are always
+getting better. They are always getting higher. And certainly
+as we look at standards for emergency preparedness, whether it
+is for dealing with the effects of a tornado or a flood or a
+terrorism event, we need a nationwide standard that we can all
+work towards that we can all build upon and try to attain.
+Because I think that is the basis not only on which we build
+our training and our exercises but it also gives us at the
+local level a goal upon which we need to build our budgets and
+build our local programs towards attaining that national
+standard.
+ Mr. Kimerer. Ranking Member Turner, September 11 stunned us
+out of a kind of lethargy about the complexities of preparing
+for and responding to the myriad possibilities of both disaster
+and evil in the world. It illuminated for us, as did the TOPOFF
+exercise, the need to greatly expand the frame of reference we
+must acknowledge and build in order to be prepared to respond--
+to prevent, detect, deter and respond. Things like unification
+of intelligence data, making it more accessible, having better
+and more robust data collection around the specific threats
+that materialize in the realm of terrorism, those were things
+that were not pre-occupying concerns of local and regional and
+State law enforcement before September 11 or before we
+undertook these kind of exercises. They contributed to the need
+to have baseline, I guess, standards, for want of a better
+term, but certainly objectives and doctrine and goals that we
+must all acknowledge and all work toward.
+ The absence of a national incident command system, which
+some of us have been saying probably should have been in place
+many years ago, was certainly brought home to us and is now a
+priority objective of agencies like mine and, clearly, the
+Department of Homeland Security. That represents an essential
+and kind of universal benchmark and standard that we need to
+aspire to.
+ All of this of course, depends upon a kind of collective
+recognition of what is important, of what is essential; and I
+think together we will very shortly come up with what
+represents the basic, essential doctrine we use to determine
+how we take care of our citizens at all levels of government in
+the face of all realities, whether it is an accident of nature
+or the work of an evil intellect bent on destruction.
+ Am I answering your question?
+ Mr. Turner. I think you are. I think it is going to be very
+difficult to motivate the Congress to adequately fund the needs
+that we have, particularly at the State and local level, unless
+we first establish some essential capabilities that we are
+trying to build. As long as we are just passing out money
+without any measurement of what that money is achieving, I
+think it is going to be very easy for the Congress and the
+administration to simply say, well, this is all we can afford.
+And I think if you define through some logical process, a
+planning process, what it is we are trying to build in this
+country, based upon the real threats and vulnerabilities that
+we face, which is the responsibility, I think of the Department
+under the law to determine, if we don't have any measurements,
+we are not going to get to the end goal and there will be not
+be sufficient political pressure to get us there.
+ So I hope all of you will continue to advocate that
+position as we go through this process, like we mandate in the
+legislation that we have reported out of this committee. We
+mandate that the process take place so we will know what we are
+trying to build.
+ Mr. Kimerer. Sir, I couldn't agree more; and there are a
+couple of things on point to that.
+ First, all of our work has been--
+ Ms. Dunn. [Presiding.] If you will be brief.
+ Mr. Kimerer. Oh, I am sorry. Two very quick things then.
+ We approach our identification on the basis of threat
+assessment, the intel, of risk assessment and risk analysis.
+That is the formula upon which we at the local level and the
+regional and State level are making our decisions.
+ And the second is we are proceeding with doctrine which I
+think is right on point, like national incident management to
+further move the ball down the field; and we endorse those
+efforts and are participants in the design of it.
+ Ms. Dunn. Thank you very much.
+ The gentleman's time has expired.
+ Ms. Mencer, can you talk to us a bit about the lessons
+learned from TOPOFF 2? And exactly, as you mentioned, we are
+going into the planning of TOPOFF 3 What is it that you take
+into consideration that you learned from the last set of
+exercises a year ago?
+ Ms. Mencer. I would be happy to do that.
+ If I could address for a minute the other question, look at
+the moving target, as Mr. Mefferd described, that has been
+assigned to us with Homeland Security Decision Directive 8,
+which talks about how to measure preparedness. We are indeed
+looking at establishing essential tasks and how to develop the
+capabilities needed by communities to address different
+incidents. We will be available to provide an in-depth briefing
+on that, if you wish, as to where we are with that process.
+ As to the lessons learned from TOPOFF, I would like to hand
+that over to Corey to address.
+ Mr. Gruber. Thank you, Ma'am. We started the exercise when
+we developed the concept with objectives. Objectives are the
+foundation of exercise design. And each objective is an
+expectation of performance. So as we designed the exercise and
+then completed and analyzed that performance, that is what
+allowed us to identify specific lessons. And we had a
+voluminous amount of lessons and hundreds of evaluators across
+the Country who were looking at the performance at each
+exercise venue.
+ Out of that, we distilled those down into the reports that
+you have seen that we produced for every participant. We ran a
+series of after-action conferences, both in the venues and at
+the national level, to examine those lessons.
+ We have built a secure but unclassified Web portal that has
+a lessons-learned/information-sharing component that has over
+3,000 registrants across the Nation who are using the portal to
+access that information.
+ Some of the most important points that we learned out of
+the TOPOFF exercise, I will start with the foremost one, we had
+a Department that was all of roughly 70 days old. And it
+provided us with an unparalleled opportunity to look at our
+roles and responsibilities for all of these disciplines that
+had converged under Homeland Security in a manner that was
+unprecedented. It afforded us a great opportunity, at the very
+start of the exercise, to help to define and literally
+engineer, in the course of the exercise, roles for people like
+principal Federal officials--how, as Clark and Tom have both
+alluded to, we worked together and clarified our
+responsibilities.
+ We also learned very important lessons about how we
+understand the impact and the effects of the agents that we
+used in the exercise. As Tom alluded to, how do we get a common
+technical picture of the event that occurred so that we can
+predict the consequences, understand how it impacts our public,
+and make sure we are providing them with the right information?
+ As a result of that exercise, we developed an integrated
+emergency communications plan that was actually a result of the
+very first seminar that we did in the exercise series, which
+was focused on public affairs and had 74 public information
+officers from across the Country at it. I'd like to give Tom an
+opportunity to talk about some of the concrete lessons on
+bioterrorism, and perhaps Clark on the radiological. But it was
+a tremendous opportunity to think about the roles and
+responsibilities for the Department.
+ Tom?
+ Mr. Mefferd. Obviously, the bioterrorism scenario is
+significantly different than the radiological dirty bomb in
+that it did not have any of the--typically, what is used in the
+business--the blood and guts and gore that goes along with a
+typical disaster. All we had was a whole bunch of ambulance
+calls to start it off with. We have learned since the exercise,
+I think, better sharing of information.
+ There has been significant work--Mr. Turner talked earlier
+about the issues of communications with our hospitals. In the
+State of Illinois, for example, we are installing as we speak a
+satellite-based communications system that will link our
+primary command post hospitals Statewide. We have a new system
+that the Illinois Department of Public Health has brought
+online to share patient information across the board, so as we
+look at hospital capabilities, bed capabilities and so on and
+so forth, that can be rapidly transmitted to our State Public
+Health Command Center in Springfield.
+ We are also working on increased communications
+capabilities to ensure that we have good epidemiology as well
+as the ability to share that epidemiology.
+ Another major thing that came out of this exercise was
+really built on TOPOFF 1 the headaches of the Strategic
+National Stockpile. How does it work? How do we bring it into a
+State? And ultimately, how do we get it to the residents that
+need it? In our county alone, we have spent at least now 2.5
+years before TOPOFF as well as since TOPOFF working those
+points. And we anticipate shortly being done with the
+establishment of multiple sites around our county where we can
+treat every man, woman and child in a reasonable amount of time
+to give them the prophylactic drugs that they need in this
+situation. Those are directly a result of the lessons that we
+learned in TOPOFF.
+ How do we do it? How do we manage it? How do we make it
+work? You do it one way in an exercise, and then you build on
+those capabilities for real.
+ Mr. Kimerer. The last time I was asked to recap the lessons
+learned for Seattle from TOPOFF, 3 hours later people were
+exiting the room. I will not subject you to that.
+ We learned hundreds of fixable things right off the bat,
+things that were more logistical in nature, some of which we
+want to remain confidential but involved how to manage a
+command post and have the right equipment and anticipate the
+decon requirements and things like that. To that end alone, if
+nothing else happened in TOPOFF, we would be miles ahead of
+where we were before the exercise. And we have literally
+addressed all but about 5 percent of those small fixable
+things.
+ Some of the larger issues, we are working diligently to
+address. We had an issue with plume modeling which got some
+press nationally where there were conflicts in attempting to
+ascertain the degree to which contamination was present in the
+atmosphere. In the end, that did not hamper the field
+operations because the field commanders quite wisely said,
+``Give me the largest plume, and that is what we are going to
+respond to.''
+ Since then, there has been a lot of academic work to create
+what is called consensus plume modeling which actually will
+meet that gap. Those kinds of details were really invaluable to
+address, again, in times of calm rather than in times of
+crisis.
+ Our focus has been to continue to refine our precision in
+implementing incident command, equipping our first responders
+and dealing with the influx of various interests and needs,
+including what has not really been mentioned today, the
+business community and the private sector, in the redress of a
+critical incident. And that does include coordination with our
+Federal partners and making sure we do not have overlapping
+jurisdictions or what I affectionately refer to as
+jurisdictional creep, which I was gratified to see was not a
+big factor in our experience with TOPOFF 2.
+ Ms. Dunn. Thank you very much.
+ Thank you all of you.
+ Now, I would like to call on Congressman Thompson, who has
+8 minutes for questioning.
+ Mr. Thompson. Thank you Madam Chairman.
+ And I appreciate the testimony offered today in the
+hearing.
+ Ms. Mencer, if either one of the scenarios we heard today
+happened in a community of 10,000, what would the response be?
+ Ms. Mencer. Well, you mean, what would the response of the
+Department be or the communities?
+ Mr. Thompson. Well, yes.
+ Ms. Mencer. All right. Well, I think that we have made
+great strides with every successive TOPOFF, as has been
+described, with better communications and better plans.
+ I think, even at the local level, in the smallest
+community, because of the grant process where everyone has to
+communicate what their needs are, what their assessment is of
+their readiness and what equipment they still need, what
+training and exercises they need, they are all talking to each
+other, which we did not really see prior to September 11th. We
+did see this with the individual TOPOFF exercises.
+ But now every community in the Nation, and in the
+territories, has been talking about, how do we prepare better
+as a unit, as a community, not just law enforcement, not just
+fire, but working together?
+ So I think, all of the lessons that were learned in other
+communities, are being shared across the Country through the
+Web sites that we have up that share best practices. So I think
+it would be a much better response than we would have seen
+prior to September 11th.
+ Mr. Thompson. Well, I guess the question is, have you
+conducted any internal review of a scenario in a rural area,
+either one of these situations?
+ Mr. Gruber. Sir, we have conducted almost 400 exercises
+across the Country, and they have been in every State and
+territory. And some of those have involved scenarios in rural
+settings. In fact, the very first TOPOFF was done in the State
+of New Hampshire, in a relatively small community, Portsmouth,
+New Hampshire, which is about 25,000 population, and which
+relies very heavily on mutual aid. The event was a chemical
+event, explosively disseminated, and involving hundreds of
+victims. They relied on resources throughout the State and the
+entire region. And that is an important point that the
+Secretary and others have made about emphasizing and
+strengthening mutual aid assistance compacts for communities
+that do not have all the resources available.
+ Mr. Thompson. Well, so the comments I get from rural fire
+departments and sheriffs departments and other people about
+having adequate equipment to deal with emergencies and other
+things, is your testimony that that is not the case?
+ Mr. Gruber. No, sir, no. We, obviously, know that there is
+great need. We are trying, though, speaking specifically about
+exercises, to encourage very strongly and, in fact, in the
+manuals that we have published and the guidance that goes out
+with the grants, to strongly encourage States to make sure that
+exercises are available to their communities, and then that
+communities participate, not just in isolation but as mutual
+aid, as emergency management assistance compacts, to draw
+resources from where they may not have them organically to that
+setting.
+ Mr. Thompson. Well, for my own information, can you provide
+this committee with a State-by-State listing of those
+demonstrations that have gone on?
+ Mr. Gruber. Yes, sir, we have that breakdown by exercise,
+by location, by scenario. We would be happy to provide it.
+ Mr. Thompson. Ms. Mencer, I do not want to pick on you so
+much, but you know, it is your job. The issue of how we pick
+off--pick the TOPOFF scenarios, I know we are going on to,
+based on your testimony, to Connecticut and New Jersey next. We
+have two Members from New Jersey on the subcommittee, one from
+Connecticut. And I would hope, at some point, you will involve
+them in the exercise. I would shudder to think of you going to
+those two States without at least involving those Members in
+what you do.
+ Have there been any communication with any of the Members
+of the committee?
+ Ms. Mencer. Well, the process to select the venue sites is
+a long one and a competitive one and one where they volunteer
+to be the sites. So the States themselves were very active
+participants in this selection process and raised their hand to
+do that. And it was a selection process that ensued, and they
+won. But, yes, we will indeed involve them in this as we
+proceed.
+ Mr. Thompson. Well, I think that is really important
+because, at some point, just like you have people from Seattle
+here, and I am sure they were intricately involved in what you
+did in Seattle, they ought to be likewise involved in their
+communities. So I would encourage that.
+ Ms. Mencer. Absolutely.
+ Mr. Thompson. The Presidential Directive 8 has called for a
+multiyear National Homeland Security preparedness plan. Has
+that been done?
+ Ms. Mencer. We are in the process, sir, of implementing
+HSPD 8. It is a very complex decision directive. We actually
+have a meeting of the steering committee tomorrow where we are
+bringing in various leaders from all the disciplines that are
+involved with this process. We also have established concept
+teams that look at the essential tasks and capabilities that we
+need to establish as a Nation.
+ So we would be happy, since it is a very, very
+comprehensive decision directive, to give you an in-depth
+briefing on that, because it is quite complicated. Yes, we
+would be happy to.
+ Mr. Thompson. Now, has the President formally adopted it
+and provided it?
+ Ms. Mencer. We have done briefings up to the Secretary
+level. And of course, it is a presidential decision directive,
+so the President is aware of the directive, yes.
+ Mr. Thompson. No more questions.
+ Ms. Dunn. The Chair yields 5 minutes to the gentleman
+from--where are you from, Jim? Nevada?
+ Chairman Gibbons.
+ Mr. Gibbons. Yes, I will take Nevada. Ladies and gentlemen,
+thank you very much for your presence here today. Thank you,
+for your testimony, it has been very helpful to us with regard
+to our better understanding of these exercises.
+ There are three very brief questions I want to ask, and
+perhaps, I should get them out first and let each and every one
+of you pick one of the three that you want to answer because 5
+minutes isn't enough time to ask this.
+ First of all, with relation to focusing on regions, with
+these exercises, to what extent do you incorporate and at what
+point do you incorporate the military inasmuch as there is
+always going to be a jurisdiction who's got the best equipment,
+who's got a better response capability, who should be in charge
+when you are regionalizing that? I am sure that Seattle is a
+big area, but if the National Guard of the State of Washington
+were called in, it obviously would have a capability that
+perhaps the City of Seattle does not have.
+ So at what point in these regional exercises do you call in
+your military, your State military and/or Federal Military?
+That is one.
+ second, to what extent has public relations within the
+gambit of these exercises affected either the implementation of
+the lessons learned or the exercise itself? And how has public
+relations affected that? It is obviously very critical to have
+the public involved in what is going on, not only for
+confidence but also for just the basic control of what is
+expected out there in terms of the public's need-to-know.
+ And finally, the intelligence-sharing aspect is very
+critical to me. I want to know whether or not you feel the
+communities and, especially you, Chief, feel you are getting
+the intelligence you need today to meet the threats and the
+responses to these threats that you are planning for in the
+future. So any one of those three questions. You have 3
+minutes; 1 minute each will be fine.
+ Mr. Kimerer. I think the wise person goes first, so you get
+to pick one of the three questions. Let me take the one I think
+you directed to me which has to do with the intelligence
+sharing.
+ Thing is, the big frontier, it represents one of the most
+challenging parts of creating the structure of prevention,
+detection, deterrence and response. We are working in our
+region through military nexus it so happens, through LINCS,
+which the Navy is kind of the sponsoring agency for. The model
+seeks to create a data warehouse that is secured and enables
+agencies throughout the region to access the information and
+then, further and more to the point, create a unified
+analytical structure, so that it is not raw data, but data that
+is being processed in a joint fashion.
+ That I think is an importable model. It can be used on a
+national level and represents what I think might emerge as kind
+of the gold standard in organizing this incredibly complicated
+and voluminous issue of intelligence collection, analysis, and
+sharing.
+ As far as our communication with DHS on the intelligence
+front through the Joint Terrorism Task Forces, it has been very
+good. I was prepared to say that we still have a lot of
+problems, and of course, we can always be better. You do not
+have to be bad to be better. But I am finding regular
+briefings, regular updates, regular access to my counterparts
+in the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security on issues of
+the moment having to do with intelligence.
+ Mr. Gruber. Sir, if I might, I will address the public
+relations question. At the request of the community, in TOPOFF
+2, the very first seminar we conducted was on public relations
+and on emergency public information, because the community felt
+that was the most important issue that we had to struggle with.
+We had 74 public information officers who were involved in that
+exercise at that seminar. To make sure that the public was
+aware, a very important objective was to reassure the public
+about what we were doing. So we took out full-page ads in
+newspapers. We conducted press conferences in the venue. You
+saw a little bit in the video of Secretary Ridge conducting a
+national press conference so that the media could help inform
+the public about this event that was occurring.
+ The exercise was covered by over 670 media releases, print
+and press. It had very extensive coverage, as you saw reflected
+in the video. We also had an extensive network of citizen
+volunteers who helped in the exercise, role-played as victims,
+and supported the exercise activity. That was a very important
+component.
+ And finally, for future exercises, our Assistant Secretary
+for Public Affairs, Ms. Neely, and her team have been integral
+to the planning process to insure that, both in terms of
+reassuring the public and in terms of designing an exercise
+that accurately reflects the issues related to public
+relations, that that is done effectively and accurately.
+ Mr. Mefferd. If I might, let me build on the public
+information and then move into the military for the second. I
+want to indicate one of the things that we really did, that we
+felt worked very well with regard to public information prior
+to the exercise, was a cooperative effort between DHS, which at
+that time was just the FEMA portion. FEMA conducted for the
+Chicago venue an Advanced Public Information Officers Course at
+their national academy in Evansburg. This gave us the
+opportunity to bring together public information officers from
+the City of Chicago, from the outer counties, as well as the
+State of Illinois, to work through one week of hard work,
+learning to work together as a team. And that is one of the
+things that we have tried to keep going since that time.
+ From the military side, and just the State military, but
+certainly one of the things that we have in the State of
+Illinois which we are pretty proud of is a seven-part response
+that relates not only to State capabilities but local
+capabilities. From the State capability, the State has built
+something called a State weapons of mass destruction response
+team. A critical component of that response team is the civil
+support team which is part of the National Guard Service. The
+system that we have established in the State of Illinois is
+that any time that there is a weapon of mass destruction or a
+terrorism incident, a call is immediately placed to the State
+Emergency Operating Center, and within 90 minutes tops--again,
+obviously the State of Illinois is a big State--but in 90
+minutes tops, there will be representation on the ground from
+the State Weapons of Mass Destruction Team, including the Civil
+Support Team.
+ So we feel they are an integral part of our terrorism
+response, not only for planning but training.
+ Ms. Dunn. You did not run over.
+ Thank you all for your answers.
+ The Chair yields 8 minutes to the gentleman from
+Washington, Mr. Dicks.
+ Mr. Dicks. I want to thank all the witnesses today.
+ And Clark, good to see you again and appreciate your good
+work out there.
+ Let me just ask one thing on communications. There was--as
+I understand--there was a problem between the Seattle Fire
+Department and the Police Department, in terms of
+communications. Has that been fixed since TOPOFF 2 in terms of
+communications interoperability?
+ Mr. Kimerer. Yes, actually, we have a pretty good
+infrastructure in actually the whole of the State of Washington
+but particularly King County that supports sharing frequencies
+and allowing for an expansion of our interoperable
+communication as needed.
+ Of course, it tends to be a rather expensive proposition,
+but the ability of the Police and Fire Department, as well as
+mutual aid agencies in our region, has increased hundredfold
+immediately before and since TOPOFF& And we look to, you know,
+even broadening that to create a regional or even a Statewide
+network that allows for interoperable communication and
+flexibility in communications.
+ We were able to communicate on the basic frequencies. Where
+I think we had some challenges when we started breaking off
+into tactical frequencies, specific taskings, special
+operations things of that kind, the depth that we needed was
+not present. It is now. We still have more to do and more to
+go, but we have certainly addressed a fair number of those
+issues and will continue to work on it as we--
+ Mr. Dicks. In your statement, you mentioned doctrine,
+policy and plans. Give me a sense of what this doctrine--I
+mean, is this a doctrine of how to respond to a terrorist
+attack, or is it a doctrine of how to respond to a natural
+disaster? What is the difference here?
+ Mr. Kimerer. I can give you an example that exists which is
+probably the best one, rather than making one up. The doctrine
+of, say, incident command says that there are three priorities
+you address, and they are priorities. First, life safety.
+Second, incident stabilization. Third, property conservation.
+ As a commander in the field, when I have decisions to make,
+when I have resources that I need to commit, I now have a very
+clear set of principles that tell me what my priorities are and
+where I make the choices.
+ Similarly, with something like terrorism, the doctrine of
+importance to stabilize the incident and to contain it and to
+search for additional threats, additional acts of terrorism, is
+very high. It has to be always kept in mind. These are the kind
+of things that a commander--
+ Mr. Dicks. That is a terrific answer. Let me ask you this.
+As Ms. Mencer explained, it is a police scene, too, at the same
+time.
+ Mr. Kimerer. That is right.
+ Mr. Dicks. Where does that fit into this?
+ Mr. Kimerer. That is a very good question.
+ Mr. Dicks. I would hope it is not the highest.
+ Mr. Kimerer. Not the highest. The highest is treating the
+injured and dealing with the mass casualty, and that, too,
+defines how we respond and how we manage the scene. We yield to
+the fire department, who has the priority in dealing with the
+people that need the help. We support them. When we have to
+make a choice between preserving a crime scene and helping
+somebody who is injured, it's an easy choice to make. Those are
+the doctrinal issues that we hope become more and more and more
+clear as time goes on. Exercises help us do it. Some of the
+work that is being done by DHS is helping us.
+ But we want everybody in that town of 10,000 to know that
+that is the most important thing, this is the second most
+important, and then, from there, you build policies and plans.
+ Mr. Dicks. How did the mayor get along--the mayor was kind
+of running the show, right?
+ Mr. Kimerer. Yes, he was.
+ Mr. Dicks. And then the Federal Government had its lead
+agency. Was that FEMA?
+ Mr. Kimerer. The National Response Plan calls for the
+Principal Federal Official; the PFO was on the ground quickly
+in the incident and was the overall coordinator of the myriad
+Federal assets that were there.
+ Mr. Dicks. Who was?
+ Mr. Kimerer. Mike Byrne.
+ Mr. Dicks. From where?
+ Mr. Kimerer. DHS.
+ Mr. Dicks. As I understand it, Mr. Gibbons is not here, but
+when we were out at Northern Command and I asked this question,
+which, as a Member of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee I
+have been concerned about, when is the military called into
+this, and how would that happen? And I was told that if the
+lead Federal agency feels that there is a requirement for
+military equipment or military personnel, that they would then
+be the person who would communicate with Northern Command, and
+you have got--we have, of course, the National Guard out there
+in the State of Washington, and they have got--what do they
+call it? The Regional Response Team.
+ Mr. Kimerer. Uh-huh.
+ Mr. Dicks. They would be involved, but there might be
+something beyond that you might need from the military in terms
+of if you were dealing with weapons of mass destruction or
+something like that. Did you guys get into that? Was the
+military called into this thing in any way, shape or form?
+ Mr. Kimerer. Military was present from the beginning.
+ Mr. Dicks. Was it the National Guard?
+ Mr. Kimerer. Both CERT, the National Guard, in fact there
+was NORTHCOM representation.
+ Mr. Dicks. They were actually there?
+ Mr. Kimerer. Yes. Of course, the issue is, when that switch
+is flipped, what are the conditions and criteria that need to
+be met to engage the military in whole or part?
+ Of course, States like Washington have laws about
+activation of the National Guard, and they proceed from
+declarations or proclamations of the governor.
+ But having said all of that, the help we received, the
+guidance, the counsel, the prepositioning of potential
+resources that might be needed as the situation unfolded from
+the military was invaluable. And it was well rehearsed, and I
+think it is going to be there for us in the event we do need to
+invoke that.
+ Mr. Dicks. How did the Federal-State relationship work? I
+mean, ultimately, you get down to making some decisions. How
+did that decision-making process work?
+ Mr. Kimerer. They were just remarkably respectful of us. I
+am not sure what was going on when they were all by themselves.
+No, I think that their posture was facilitation of counsel and
+guidance, of offering support and a position of readiness to
+take over when the jurisdiction needed to change.
+ We can't look at these incidents as being, you know,
+defined in a single event, single jurisdiction. When police and
+fire, fire in particular, have resolved a mass casualty
+incident, then you go into the crime scene investigation which
+is an FBI lead, which involves a change in jurisdiction of
+which then we become the support entity. When that is
+resolved--and there may be myriad of other changes in
+jurisdiction and resource allocation between then--we go into
+consequence management, which FEMA has a lead in, and DHS
+obviously has a big role to play.
+ That continuum of engagement, I thought, was played out
+pretty well in TOPOFF. It wasn't always pretty. We were doing
+some education along the way. But there was a spirit of
+helpfulness and support that I found to be pretty uninterrupted
+and pretty commendable during the course of the exercise.
+ Mr. Dicks. I am told that the hospitals, the health care
+side of this thing was of some concern. Is that right? I mean,
+of having adequate facilities or being able to work with--we
+had a lot of hospitals in the Seattle Puget Sound area.
+ Mr. Kimerer. We learned a lot about the public health
+coordination side of the thing. Tom might be the one to ask.
+They got the full meal deal on hospital coordination.
+ Mr. Mefferd. As I indicated earlier, one of the big
+problems we had was communication between the hospitals. We
+ramped up and played, if I remember, we had 130 hospitals
+Statewide that played in this exercise. One of the comments I
+have made in my written testimony is the issue of, we have got
+to look at the scope of the exercise, and that is probably one
+of the areas that we went a little farther than we should have.
+And that led to some of our communications problems in the
+exercise.
+ As I indicated, one of the things we are currently working
+on in the State of Illinois at this time is the ability to
+communicate Statewide over a satellite-based communications
+system as well as an Internet-based data system tracking beds
+and patients and so forth. So, again, we have learned a lot
+from that exercise to more effectively work as a team.
+ But the one problem we get into when we deal with hospitals
+is hospitals are profit-making entities as compared to
+Government-run organizations. As we look at the Government
+operation, we have to look at that a little differently as we
+look at hospitals, and I think we are doing very well with it.
+ Mr. Dicks. Thank you.
+ Ms. Dunn. Thank you very much, Mr. Dicks.
+ Let me just pursue one question that Mr. Dicks asked you,
+chief, and I would like you to respond. And that was the
+question that only the principal Federal official would be able
+to call in the military, NORTHCOM for example. What if there is
+a situation where, a political situation, perhaps, where a
+mayor or public official is the principal officer and does not
+want to give up control of the situation to the extent of
+calling the military? Is there anything there that is
+available, a team of people who can be there and see that it is
+time to call them in and yet they haven't been called in?
+ Mr. Kimerer. Well, of course, we are all going to be
+working in a centralized operations context, an operations
+center, which allows, obviously, access to all the key decision
+makers. The mayor can be dealing with the principal Federal
+official directly on issues that may result in some conflict or
+disagreement.
+ Of course, the use of the military, probably, I think
+literally has to proceed from a presidential directive, which
+brings it into an entirely different spectrum. I would actually
+be interested in kind of the mechanics of it from Sue and
+Corey's standpoint. But my understanding, the National Response
+Plan provides for that, but only with the appropriate checks
+and balance of it proceeding from a declaration from the Oval
+Office. And in that event, unless there is an exigency, we will
+be governed by, you know, obviously, the Federal requirements
+and the Federal law.
+ But I do say, on the other side of it, that nothing would
+be done in a vacuum the way we are structured now. The mayor
+would have, or the governor or the county executive would have,
+free and open opportunity to address the issue with the
+principal Federal official and anybody else that has
+jurisdiction over the matter.
+ Ms. Dunn. Good. Thank you very much.
+ Let me now call on the gentleman from New Jersey, Mr.
+Andrews, for 8 minutes of questioning.
+ Mr. Andrews. Thank you, Madam Chairman, and I appreciate
+the panel's work, and certainly the exercise is very worthy,
+and I have learned a lot by listening to your comments today.
+Thank you.
+ I want to pick up on something that Mr. Gibbons and Mr.
+Dicks was talking about, which is this crucial interface
+between military authority and the existing civilian authority
+at the time of an emergency.
+ Now, I am assuming that this exercise was designed in such
+a way that you began when the emergency was reported. Is that
+correct? So there wasn't any part of the exercise prior to the
+explosion of the radiological bomb and the detection of the
+first people with the plague. Is that correct?
+ Mr. Kimerer. Yes, as far as the full field exercise on May
+12, that is correct. We did have an exercise the week before on
+cyber terrorism which was very interesting.
+ Mr. Andrews. One of the things I would suggest is, just in
+terms of the future TOPOFF, that you might want to start the
+process early. In Amman, Jordan, in April of this year, they
+did not have an exercise. They had a real situation where the
+Jordanian secret police uncovered a plot to detonate several
+truck bombs around the U.S. embassy in Amman, Jordan. And the
+reports are they successfully intercepted the attack and
+prevented the deaths of anywhere from 20,000 to 80,000 people.
+ I am curious what would happen in our exercise if it began
+earlier. In other words, if you started the clock when there
+was some credible operational intelligence that trucks were on
+the way with a chemical weapon on them. That is when we get the
+answer to how the military fits into this concept.
+ You know, one of the intriguing policy and legal questions
+is this Principal Federal Officer--if I am using the correct
+term--if I read the law correctly, can ask for military help,
+certainly, but certainly can't order it. That is something that
+the President of the United States down through the Secretary
+of Defense would have to do, which raises some questions about
+posse comitatus and exceptions to the posse comitatus law.
+ It raises a whole host of the questions which were not
+dealt with in this exercise, I understand, about how this all
+relates. If people--I assume people from NORCOM--were people
+from NORCOM present? Northern Command?
+ Mr. Kimerer. Yes.
+ Mr. Andrews. I am sure they were present because they were
+invited to come and observe, correct?
+ Mr. Kimerer. Corey?
+ Mr. Gruber. NORCOM and the Secretary of Defense's
+representatives have been involved, and have been involved in
+the design from the beginning of the exercise.
+ Mr. Andrews. I understand that, but in real life, they
+wouldn't be sitting there in the police operations center of
+Seattle or Chicago.
+ Mr. Gruber. In fact, that would be at the request, again,
+of the mayor, the governor, and then the Federal authorities.
+ Mr. Andrews. I think our next scenario needs to start
+sooner, because, you know, really dealing with two problems
+here. It sounds to me you thoroughly vetted the second of the
+two problems, which is what do you do once a disastrous attack
+has occurred, in this case two of them? Who responds? What do
+you do when you are working that through?
+ There is another, which is, what do you do in those golden
+moments or hour when you, say, believe an attack is imminent
+and you have operational intelligence that might enable you to
+prevent the attack? What happens then? And I do think it is
+important that the next scenario take that into consideration.
+ Obviously, the 9/11 Commission is dealing with that
+question retroactively. They are looking at what happened on
+the morning of 9/11 between the initial attacks on New York and
+the ultimate attack on the Pentagon and the failed attack of
+the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania, and they are trying to
+unwind who was doing what, when who was responding to whom,
+when. And that is going to be a useful exercise for us to read
+that.
+ But I think it would be more useful to do it, to engage in
+a scenario where we had such a situation and, frankly, to the
+extent possible, within the ground rules of the game scenario,
+to do so under the conditions of surprise.
+ I think this is a profoundly important question because you
+have dealt, from what I can tell, rather well with questions of
+Federal versus local and State, and public versus private
+entanglements. And that is what this exercise is about,
+thinking that all through. You had hospitals run by private,
+for-profit and nonprofit corporations. You had local police
+departments and fire departments. You had mayors and Office of
+Emergency Management, the State and county level, and I think
+the fact that you gamed this all through is very, very
+important.
+ I think the missing link and one that literally may mean
+the difference between life and death some day is going to be
+how the military fits into this, when, who gets to make the
+decision, who falls into the subordinate chain of command once
+the decision is made and so forth.
+ One more question, I read the key after-action issues
+report, and I see that, on page 4, there is the rather
+understandable finding that there were numerous issues directly
+related to lack of command-and-control discipline. The people
+sort of improvised, made things up as they went along and did
+not follow the doctrines as necessarily were supposed to be
+followed. That does not surprise me, and I don't think that is
+in any way scandalous. But I would ask the Department, Ms.
+Mencer, what have you done about it since the finding? If, God
+forbid, we had an incident this afternoon, an attack this
+afternoon, what has changed since this after-action report came
+out?
+ Ms. Mencer. What has changed has been mentioned previously,
+that we now have the National Incident Management System, which
+we are training for all over the Nation to make sure that
+communities and essentials are up to speed with how they
+perform in the event of an emergency. So NIMS has been
+instigated, and that is crucial to command and control issues.
+ The National Response Plan, of course, is now also in
+effect. As we continue to train up, those two things will
+contribute a great deal to correcting that situation.
+ Mr. Andrews. I assume that the focus of the next TOPOFF is
+going to be how well that is working. It is one thing to
+promulgate it in theory and another thing to see it in
+practice. Is there a particular weakness that emerges from the
+analysis of the first exercise in terms of chain of command?
+ Mr. Gruber. Sir, I think Clark talked about that
+eloquently, but perhaps a lot of it was that, in fact, we had a
+brand new Department with very significant responsibilities
+that was all of 74 days old. So much of what happened in the
+exercise was concept development and experimentation about
+those roles and responsibilities that have matured
+significantly because, getting back to your original point,
+there have been a host of exercises subsequent to TOPOFF 2 at a
+very senior level, looking very specifically at direction and
+control and how we do that.
+ In fact, we have conducted exercises specifically with the
+Department of Defense to look at the points you mentioned
+earlier and to explore those. In the next exercise, we will
+integrate roughly 60 days of pre-incident intelligence activity
+to build on the point that you made.
+ Mr. Andrews. I think that is important. And the
+recommendation I would make, to the extent it is feasible, is
+that the exercise start sooner. Perhaps it even start early
+enough that it could be prevented to see how we do under that
+kind of scenario.
+ Madam Chairman, thank you very much.
+ Ms. Dunn. Thank you very much.
+ I yield 8 minutes to the gentlewoman from the Virgin
+Islands, Mrs. Christensen.
+ Mrs. Christensen. Thank you, Madam Chairman, and being the
+last one here, a lot of questions have been answered, at least
+in part. And I appreciate your testimonies.
+ Deputy Chief Kimerer, I thought, in your opening statement,
+based on my recollection of our trip to Seattle, that you were
+being very diplomatic and generous when you said you would hope
+that the Federal people would recognize that the local people
+have a lot more knowledge of their approximate areas. And in
+response to Congressman Dicks, you seemed to say that the
+relationship between the Feds and the local went very well, and
+they were very supportive.
+ But that is not what I remember from my visit. It seemed as
+though the coordination was not there and that, instead of
+relying on the local first responders, sometimes they were
+overstepped.
+ Was that really one of the lessons learned?
+ And then, I would ask Ms. Mencer, what has the Department
+done--if that is indeed the case that the Department of
+Homeland Security came and they started making some of the
+decisions that probably were best left to the local first
+responders who knew the people, who had been working together,
+who knew the area, if that indeed occurred--what has happened
+to fix that problem?
+ Mr. Kimerer. Thank you, Congressman Christensen, for saying
+I am diplomatic. I do not hear that very often.
+ The thing I expected to happen, which actually framed the
+way I presented it in my comments, was there would be an awful
+lot of what I refer to as jurisdiction creep, where there would
+be a lack of clarity as to who had that kind of priority or
+primacy of jurisdiction. So my expectations were low.
+ I was grateful and pleasantly surprised that, while I am
+sure things were going on behind the scenes to try and resolve
+questions and conflicts, the general posture of the Federal
+official, the Principal Federal Official and the Federal
+agencies was one of helpfulness. Again, it may not have been as
+crystalline as we would have liked.
+ Mrs. Christensen. You were pretty upset in their reports
+that they were not--
+ Mr. Kimerer. I was focusing my attention on what was going
+on in the field. There were breakdowns in information in the
+field, certainly. I think many of them have been addressed or
+are in the process of being addressed.
+ Of course, my priority as a commander, as somebody who has
+been on the ground and who has commanded incidents is, Do I
+have, A, the independence as it were to make decisions and, B,
+do I have the support once I make those decisions?
+ Those, I think, were a success story in large measure in
+TOPOFF 2. Where we go from here and where I think kind of was
+the inspiration for my comment was to just simply, you know, be
+vigilant about the inclusion of the local perspective. My
+Department, answers 850,000 calls a year and makes 26,000
+arrests and is responsible for day-to-day policing.
+ We have a great body of experience, one that I know Ms.
+Mencer, the Secretary, and Corey Gruber appreciate. But I also
+know that when deadlines are tight and when we have an urgent
+job to do against an implacable foe, sometimes, it is easy to
+just rush into a decision process or a framework or a format.
+So I am trying to be the voice of a reminder to ensure that we
+have the experts and the inclusion we need to make this
+successful.
+ Mrs. Christensen. What has happened since that time?
+Because you cannot have any confusion or conflict between who
+is in charge and who is making decisions when you are in real
+time.
+ Mr. Kimerer. That is correct. The gentleman that proceeded
+you asked about what we are doing tangibly. I am on a group
+called the Universal Task List Support Group which is
+identifying the essential tasks that every agency needs to do
+within its own limitations to respond to a whole sequence of
+possible terrorist events. That is real, on-the-ground kind of
+work that I think seeks to resolve all potential conflicts in
+times of calm rather than crisis and sets a benchmark for all
+agencies.
+ Mrs. Christensen. My time is running really short. Ms.
+Mencer, did you want to comment briefly?
+ Ms. Mencer. What I think is interesting about exercises in
+general is that it becomes stressful, just like the actual
+incident would be. And so, because we do not generally hire
+type B personalities to deal with law enforcement and fire, and
+to be Federal officials, when you have an incident like that,
+with the type A personalities who would be in charge, because
+that is what they are trained to do, you do have some conflict
+occasionally.
+ With TOPOFF 2 Mike Byrne, who was the Principal Federal
+Official, was actually, in his previous life, a fire chief in
+New York City. So he had a local background and was able to
+relate on the scene, not only from the Federal perspective, but
+from the local one as well.
+ Mrs. Christensen. I just hope that there is a standard
+protocol that does not allow for confusion. I understand what
+happens with human beings. But I hope that there is some kind
+of clear guidance.
+ Having gone through a couple of disasters when I was not a
+legislator, sometimes we wished they would stay out of our hair
+and out of the way. Is there a role--what is the role that you
+envision for your State legislators and for us? For example, in
+a hurricane, I would be at FEMA headquarters here in their
+command center. How do we make--how do we utilize us optimally
+and not interfere in decision-making?
+ Ms. Mencer. I will let Corey answer this as well, but I
+think, at the State level, we have continuity of Government
+operation plans that are in effect in various States so that
+the local legislators know where they are to regroup and how
+they are to maintain their continuity of government. Similarly,
+we need that in the Federal Government, as well, and certainly
+are working towards having a very comprehensive plan to do
+that. You do have an important role to play. I think we saw
+that during President Reagan's funeral, when we had the plane
+over the Capitol and some concern.
+ Mrs. Christensen. To me, our immediate impulse is to be
+there where things are going on.
+ Ms. Mencer. Right, and we do not want to add to the
+confusion.
+ Mrs. Christensen. Where do you want us to be?
+ Ms. Mencer. I will ask Corey to step in.
+ Mr. Gruber. Ma'am, I think, first and foremost, as you see
+in the lessons from TOPOFF 2, there were very specific issues
+about legal authorities at every level of Government. Perhaps
+where some legal authorities conflicted with one together, for
+example the Stafford Act, and the Public Health Act, it's very
+important that legislators at all levels of Government look at
+those and help to deconflict those so that, when we respond, we
+understand our roles and have the authorities and resources we
+need to do that.
+ And then the other role, of course, is adding hearings like
+this that help us bring attention and visibility to the results
+of the exercises so that legislators, again at the State, and
+local level, understand these issues and can act on them.
+ Mrs. Christensen. I just, if I could just finish by saying,
+I see that Illinois has really done a great job in dealing with
+the health issues, but I hope that those lessons that they have
+learned become a part of the national way of operating.
+ Ms. Dunn. I thank the gentlewoman.
+ And thank the panel very much.
+ I would like the record to show that the record will remain
+open for 10 days for questions from folks or anything that you
+would like to follow up on, panel.
+ Thank you so much for coming back here to testify. It has
+been very helpful to us, I believe, listening to your analysis
+and your good lessons.
+ Thank you so much. This hearing is concluded.
+ [Whereupon, at 2:58 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]
+
+
+ A P P E N D I X
+
+ ----------
+
+
+ Material for the Record
+
+Questions for the Record For C. Suzanne Mencer, From the Honorable Jim
+ Turner
+
+Setting and Running Exercises
+ 1. How did the Homeland Security Council set its 15 different
+scenarios for measuring readiness, and how do those measures relate to
+the performance standards mandated in HSPD-8? How are those measures
+used to determine the essential capabilities needed by each state and
+local government?
+ 2. I continue to be concerned that the Department's inability to
+develop a comprehensive threat and vulnerability assessment is having a
+significant, negative impact on the conduct of your exercise program.
+ a. Do these major TOPOFF exercises focus on what an intelligence
+assessment says is a city's highest risk? Do the exercises take into
+account a city's specific critical infrastructure vulnerabilities? If
+not, why not?
+ b. Was there any reason to think that Seattle is at especially high
+risk for a dirty bomb or Chicago was at higher risk of biological
+weapons attack? Do these major TOPOFF exercises focus on what the
+intelligence and vulnerability assessment say is a city's highest risk?
+ c. Will future National-level exercises utilize scenarios that are
+consistent with the specific threats to and vulnerabilities of the
+location(s) conducting the exercise? If not, why not?
+ d. What ``preparedness standard'' is used when planning and
+conducting a terrorism exercise? What level of preparedness are we
+training to achieve? Is this level of preparedness based any risk
+assessment?
+ 3. Homeland Security Presidential Directive 8 calls for a ``multi-
+year national homeland security preparedness-related exercise plan'' to
+be approved by the President. Has that happened? What will that multi-
+year exercise plan look like?
+ 4. According to the TOPOFF 2 after action report, there were 41
+participating federal agencies. What role did Congress have? Were there
+Members of Congress that played a role in the exercise? If not, how do
+you plan to involve the Legislative Branch in future exercises and/or
+the response to an actual terrorist attack?
+ 5. How many cyberterrorism exercises have you run as part of the
+National Exercise Program? Have cyber events been included as part of
+any other large scale exercises? Which ones?
+ 6. Some experts say that these exercises, including TOPOFF 2, are
+unrealistic and don't provide a real estimate of how difficult these
+disasters are to respond to. Many of the people brought in to simulate
+victims or ``worried well'' are well-behaved and calm. Especially in
+the event of a WMD attack, I would expect people to be extremely
+frantic. People might not line up in an orderly fashion to get
+vaccines. How do you build chaos into the system during these exercises
+to see how prepared we are to keep the peace?
+ 7. If city in my district wants to conduct an exercise, how do they
+engage with ODP? Does a DHS person attend all of these exercises? Who
+does the evaluation and the drawing out of lessons learned?
+
+Exercise Coordination
+ 8. What is ODP's role in coordinating exercises that are led by the
+Coast Guard, FEMA, ICE, and other DHS agencies? When different DHS
+agencies are assisting state and local participants in running
+exercises, and how do you ensure that they provide the same technical
+guidance?
+ 9. The hearing focused on exercises that are conducted to simulate
+potential terrorist attacks and improve our readiness for such events.
+But everyday, there are real-world emergencies and events that also
+highlight areas where we aren't secure enough. I'm interested in how
+the DHS exercise program incorporates these lessons learned, whether
+from firefighters battling wildfires or the Secret Service running
+security for a national convention.
+ 10. In conducting exercises, there's clearly going to be overlap
+with other federal departments. I assume that an exercise dealing with
+bioterrorism needs to be planned in consultation with HHS. An exercise
+on identifying and dealing with an animal disease has to be coordinated
+with USDA. How does that interagency process work for planning an
+exercise, working through an exercise, and in terms of paying for it?
+Can you provide a specific example?
+ 11. How does ODP capture the lessons learned from exercises that
+are run by other departments, like HHS or Defense? Are they made part
+of the MIPT (Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism)
+database?
+ 12. How much cooperation and ``jointness'' is there between DHS and
+DOD in homeland security exercises? Are there formal organizational
+ties between DHS and DOD? At what level? Does DHS participate in DOD
+exercises? To the extent that National Guard and Guard Civil Support
+Teams participate in DHS exercises, how does that work, and are the
+Guardsmen under the Governor's or Secretary of Defense's command?
+
+TOPOFF 2 After-Action Reports/Lessons Learned
+ 13. The TOPOFF 2 after-action report for the Emergency Preparedness
+and Response Directorate and the final after-action report from the
+Department as a whole identified numerous issues directly relating to a
+lack of command and control discipline during the exercise.
+Specifically:
+ a. There seemed to be little understanding of inter- and intra-
+ agency command and control protocols, and many exercise players
+ did not fully understand the reporting relationships between
+ the FEMA Federal Coordinating Officer, the DHS Principal
+ Federal Official, the FEMA Emergency Support Team, and the DHS
+ Crisis Action Team.
+ b. The report also stated that a number of major, pre-existing
+ interagency federal plans' coordination structures and
+ processes were circumvented during the exercise.
+ What specific corrective actions have been undertaken by DHS to
+address these issues, and can you assure the Committee that we will not
+see the same types of problems in the next TOPOFF exercise.
+ 14. The reports further noted that there were logistical
+difficulties accessing DHS assets and resources. Specifically, although
+the Strategic National Stockpile was at that time under ``operational
+control'' of DHS, exercise players were confused as to whether approval
+from the Department of Health and Human Services was necessary to
+access stockpile resources. In addition, the report states that ODP's
+pre-positioned equipment program was unavailable for most of the
+exercise.
+ Again, what specific corrective actions have been undertaken by DHS
+to address these issues, and can you assure the Committee that we will
+not see the same types of problems in the next TOPOFF exercise.
+ 15. Finally, the Department's after action report noted that the
+lack of a robust and efficient emergency communications infrastructure
+in Chicago's hospital system was apparent, and that resource demands--
+including short supplies of isolation and negative pressure rooms, as
+well as staff shortages--challenged these hospitals throughout the
+exercise.
+ How is DHS working with the Department of Health and Human Services
+to address these critical problems? Can you report on any progress in
+this area?
+ 16. I understand that ODP is working with the Oklahoma City MIPT
+(Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism) to create a
+database for first responders with lessons learned from exercises. Can
+you tell me how many records there are in that database and how many
+you'd like to have and how many first responders have used it? Are
+lessons from all of the hundreds of exercises you run annually captured
+in the database? How do you notify the first responder community of the
+availability of new data in this database?
+ 17. Does DHS use the results from these exercises in evaluating
+first responder grant applications? If a city works with ODP in an
+exercise and identifies gaps in its readiness, can ODP capture that
+information when it makes the next round of grants?
+
+ Prepared Statement for the Record of Advanced Systems Technology, Inc.
+
+ Chairman Cox and members of the Committee, practicing through
+exercises and simulations will help all those who must respond in the
+wake of a terrorist attack to perform better in an actual emergency.
+Superior response, achieved through a range of proven exercises and
+simulations, will result in saved lives, minimized damage, and quicker
+recovery. In a post-September 11 world, we cannot take the importance
+of preparedness and training for granted.
+ Advanced Systems Technology commends the Committee for recognizing
+this fact and for holding this important hearing. You should know of
+the wide range of computer-based simulation tools that are readily
+available for law enforcement and public safety personnel. And
+simulation exercises have proven to work well in both military and
+civilian sectors.
+ Simulation tools range from virtual, immersive simulations that are
+highly functional for first-responder decisionmaking activities, to
+constructive simulations that are highly functional for command-level
+decisionmaking activities, to predictive simulation models that are
+used to predict how particulates or gasses move through the atmosphere.
+Each of these simulation tools has a place in the exercise and
+simulation arena, if we expect all first responders (police, fire,
+emergency medical) at all levels of government (federal, state, local,
+military) to respond most aptly should a terrorist or other catastrophe
+occur on American soil.
+ One factor holding up practicing to make perfect involves
+allocation of homeland security funds. Our understanding is that the
+Department of Homeland Security has spent funds to examine several
+simulation tools, but has not yet allowed funds to be allocated to use
+cost-saving computer simulation tools by local and state governments in
+their training or exercise activities. It is important that the DHS
+Office of State and Local Government Coordination and Preparedness
+approve computer-based model and simulation tools as a required element
+of emergency-response decisionmaking exercises and training activities
+for all hazards preparation. Otherwise, taxpayer dollars will only be
+spent on expensive exercises that certainly have a place, but should
+not be viewed as the only tool in the preparedness training toolbox.
+ With regard to civilian-military interaction and cooperation, many
+successful cross-disciplinary activities have been conducted since the
+events of September 11, 2001. For example, in the National Capital
+Region, three exercises have been conducted with joint cooperation
+among local police, fire, emergency medical services, the U.S.
+Marshal's Service, the U.S. Marine Chemical-Biological Incident
+Response Force (CBIRF), and DHS Federal Protective Service.
+ In El Paso, Texas, the Department of Justice sponsored a large
+school safety exercise directed at command-level personnel. It involved
+two schools in different school districts and exercised 21 separate
+school, local, state, federal, and military emergency response
+agencies--this without touching precious first-line resources or
+disrupting school activities.
+ Each of these large-scale, multiagency, cross-disciplinary
+exercises was stimulated by the Emergency Preparedness Incident Command
+Simulation (EPiCS) system, a system that is owned and operated by the
+U.S. Army TRADOC Analysis Center. EPiCS is the result of an effort to
+use existing military technology for civilian applications. It is based
+on the U.S. Army's Janus war game program, with state-of-the-art
+visualization tools to enhance environmental realism. EPiCS puts
+decisionmakers from each agency involved in a computer simulation
+exercise to the test in ``real time,'' using their own communications
+equipment. Unlike other programs, this simulation tool integrates on-
+site decisions and results in the likely consequences of such a
+decision. This aids in the learning process, which is why it has proven
+invaluable to crisis managers and their staffs from both civilian and
+military agencies. Command-level training goes hand-in-hand with first-
+responder training. Without one, the other will fail.
+ As most experts acknowledge, it is critical to train and exercise
+response agency personnel at all levels. Standards for such training
+are provided by the National Incident Management System and the
+National Response Plan, and measures are provided by the Homeland
+Security Exercise and Evaluation Program. Training and exercising these
+standards can be cost-effective, recorded, and repeatable using
+computer-based models and simulation.
+ A sound model for the emergency response community for standards
+training is used by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, which conducts
+a series of five exercises in an exercise cycle. This stepping-stone
+sequence focuses on each core element individually and then combines
+these activities into a unified response. The sequence begins with a
+seminar exercise that introduces the overall objectives and procedures.
+Then comes a series of tabletop exercises that progressively involve
+local, state, federal, and military resources. Using the lessons
+learned from these exercises, all agencies thenparticipate in a unified
+command-level exercise that leads to the final full-scale exercise.
+This cycle provides opportunities to discuss, revise, retrain, and
+retest aspects of training without expending valuable resources until
+all the pieces come together for a capstone, full-scale exercise. At
+each step, simulation tools are used and have proven to be valuable,
+effective, and cost-saving.
+ Simulation, virtual reality, predictive models, and constructive
+models can and should all play important parts in reducing the cost and
+increasing the value of emergency response and terrorist-related
+training and exercises. Full-scale exercises are even more valuable
+after other types of exercise activities using models and simulation
+tools have been conducted. For instance, the $16 million expended on
+TOPOFF 2 could have been spent more effectively with more robust,
+recorded, and replayable results using computer-based simulation and
+modeling tools. Or the TOPOFF exercise could have been preceded by a
+progression of other sorts of exercises in order to maximize its value.
+This perspective should be considered as the third TOPOFF exercise is
+planned and executed.
+ While practice will make perfect where terrorism and emergency
+response is concerned, it is important to keep in mind that large-scale
+exercises--which involve large numbers of personnel, tie up limited
+resources such as fire trucks and helicopters, can disrupt city streets
+and the routines of citizens, and are usually costly--are just one of
+many kinds of exercises and simulations available for this mission. All
+the tools in the toolbox of preparedness training should be employed,
+each one filling a distinct, vital part in preparation for the worst.
+ Our nation's enemies will probably not strike in the same manner on
+the same targets each time, but they clearly intend to strike.
+Therefore, first responders across the nation--from the police officer
+on the street to the midlevel commander calling the shots and
+coordinating activities to top officials--all need training, and the
+training they get should be diverse, appropriate, and cost-effective.
+Exercises are important, and computer-based simulations can make them
+better.
+
+
+
+