But management challenges remain in other areas
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has improved management of its major management activities slightly over last year, making some progress in achieving its goals in acquisition management, according to a scorecard released Wednesday by the DHS inspector general (IG).
The scorecard found DHS making "moderate" progress in acquisition management, information technology management, and emergency management--indicating that DHS was meeting many of its goals in those areas but not quite achieving "substantial" success.
However, DHS is making only modest progress in grants management and financial management due to failing to meet many of its goals in those areas. The rating "modest" is one step below a rating of "limited" on the four-step scale used by the IG office to rate the categories in its report Major Management Challenges Facing the Department of Homeland Security.
Acquisition management, which saw improvement to "moderate" status in fiscal 2009 from "modest" in fiscal 2008, still faces weakness that impede the department's progress in unifying its headquarters and component acquisition offices, the report noted.
In particular, organizational alignment and leadership are weaker parts of the department's acquisition management. The IG office determined that DHS only achieved "modest" progress in aligning its acquisition offices and defining their roles and responsibilities.
DHS uses a system where the headquarters procurement offices issues guidance but the component procurement offices maintain a decentralized authority to manage purchases for their agencies overall. This dual system crates confusion over who is ultimately responsible for acquisition decisions, the IG report argued.
The report also repeated a finding by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) that DHS has not strengthened its investment review process. A lack of involvement in reviewing lifecycle costs of major programs have left them without appropriate oversight and schedules, the report declared.
The report also hit DHS acquisition knowledge management and information systems, rating progress in meeting goals in support of them as "modest" as well. DHS must develop a department-wide contract management system and interface it with its financial system.
"With ten procurement offices and more than $17 billion in annual acquisitions and procurement, DHS needs a consolidated acquisition system to improve data integrity, reporting, performance measurement, and financial accountability," the report stated.
The IG office also found DHS information technology management to generally be a brighter spot but hit the department's IT budget oversight and portfolio management. US Citizenship and Immigration Services, for example, has not complied with budget control processes, creating difficulties in determining IT budgets for the agency.
While the DHS IT Strategic Plan calls for the effective management of IT capabilities in support of the department's missions, DHS has not fully identified areas where it can standardize, consolidate, and optimize its IT infrastructure.
DHS generally performed fairly with its emergency management functions, the IG report said. However, emergency management faced continued weaknesses in disaster housing and disaster mitigation.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) lacks the tools, procedures, and authority to promote the repair of housing damaged after disasters--a very cost-effective way of restoring housing to victims of disasters, the report contended.
In addition, FEMA should define favorable goals in the event of particular disaster scenarios and incorporate them in its National Disaster Housing Strategy, the report said.
AS for mitigating repetitive damage to properties in disaster-prone areas, FEMA has made little or no progress since at least 2002, the report commented, largely because FEMA lacks some authority to do so.
FEMA only has the power to promote mitigation so it cannot force property owners in flood hazard areas, for example, to take steps to mitigate damage to their homes, the report noted. But mitigation experts could gain access to better information on repetitive loss properties to determine the best mitigation strategies.
Modest progress
Grants management and financial management were the weakest management areas for the department, the report found.
While FEMA made "moderate" progress in meeting the goals of successful disaster grants management, it made only "modest" progress in doing so for non-disaster grants.
For both, FEMA should exert more influence to implement improved oversight of subgrantees. But non-disaster grants management suffers from inconsistent and incomplete financial and program monitoring, the report found, partly because FEMA does not have enough grants management staffers to manage the programs.
Financial management at the department also remains weak, with the IG office granting a score of "modest" to the department's efforts. Both military and civilian financial systems at DHS face tremendous challenges.
The US Coast Guard has made little progress in tackling internal control weaknesses identified by an audit in fiscal 2008, the report said. Those weaknesses include a lack of an effective general ledger system and a lack of effective policies, procedures, and controls surrounding the financial reporting process.
While the Coast Guard plans to overcome many of these problems in future years, it lacked sufficient financial management personnel to resolve these issues in fiscal 2009, the report said.
With regard to its civilian financial systems, DHS has several internal control weaknesses in its financial reporting, particularly at FEMA and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), the report said. Financial reporting actually deteriorated at US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) during fiscal 2009 as well, but problems at that agency are not as bad as problems at FEMA and TSA, the report characterized.
"Among the deficiencies noted in the FY 2009 independent auditor's report is that the department lacks a sufficient number of accounting and financial management personnel with core technical competencies to ensure its financial statements are prepared accurately and in compliance with generally accepted accounting principles. This condition was common among CBP, FEMA, and TSA in FY 2009," the report concluded.
The IG office produces a report concerning Major Management Challenges Facing the Department of Homeland Security on an annual basis, as required by the Reports Consolidation Act of 2000 (Public Law 106-531).
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