burch talked about. i would say we depend on customs and border patrol to tell us what their needs are. we're hearing from the agency and we're hearing from the folks that are working on the ground that 90% is a reasonable floor, and i think it would be dangerous to use as a cap because these are the guys that are out there. they know the impacts that are happening every day. they know the kind of intrusions on that border that, quite frankly, i don't hear about and most of the folks that live closer to the border than i do don't hear about. i don't speak for senator mccain, and it's too bad he

isn't here. if -- if there wanted to be an audit done and that audit showed that that 90% floor was too high or not high enough, that might be be a way to go, but i think to put it as a ceiling -- put it as a ceiling would be dangerous. >> okay. rchltsz i yield. >> i have other questions for mr. hamrick. there are six cases of misuse under your office, is that right? >> my office has conducted six investigations that were referred to us by the osc. >> there were ten total referrals, right? >> i -- >> that's the number. >> okay. so where are the other four cases and who's investigating those? >> because there was an

allegation of auo misuse against the office of internal affairs, we are no longer -- our agents are no longer investigating those. >> i understand. thank you. >> i want to go back in time to 2012 and i know the problem with the administratively and patrolable overtime is not a new one. back then i think the president in his fiscal 2012 budget request included a legislative proposal that attempted to address this problem by putting border patrol into a system as you know known as the law enforcement availability pay or l.e.a.p. and as i understand it the law enforcement availability pay proposal generally applies

to criminal investigations such as the fbi, drug enforcement agency or secret service agents, gives them a 25% salary increase based on the expectation that they will be available to work as needed, and that was a proposal in 2012 congress failed to act. let me just ask, if i could, mr. botello and mr. judd, could you explain to us what happened in 2012 with this legislative proposal and if you would, please explain why you believe the custom mccain bill is an improvement over the 2012 legislative improvement to put border patrol on l.e.a.p. along with dea, the fbi, secret service. mr. botello? >> so the agency and through the request advocated for conversion to l.e.a.p. in the sense that it did offer the same kind of savings that are contemplated here, but there were several

voices, take holders that were not enamored with the way l.e.a.p. is used. >> who might those stakeholders be? >> the national border patrol council among others seated to my left. >> okay. what were their reservations? >> well, like what's contemplated here, flsa was not going to be remuneration going forward. they were concerned d i'll let brandon speak for himself. the concerns we heard from them was there wasn't a threshold to which to manage against or to and they were concerned that people like me would abuse that. what's contemplated in the legislation are thresholds and unilateral ability for management right to assign folks to keep them below or near -- or at the threshold and so what he -- what's here is much improved from that experience. this borrows a lot from l.e.a.p. in the sense that it so he llid

the macro budget and it allows us not to use flsa as an unpredictable cost in the future. >> mr. judd, do you agree? did you approve this message? >> i absolutely agree that it was the national border patrol council that was adamantly opposed to l.e.a.p. the simple reason that we're opposed to l.e.a.p. is because this whole notion that all you have to do is be available to be paid, somebody needs to go back and read the law and i think that you need to start investigating some other agencies. in fact, the law specifically states that you must maintain certain number of hours that you have to be scheduled. the problem with l.e.a.p. is you can schedule me for ten hours, if you work over ten hours, it's free. it's free. there is no mechanism to force them to let me go after ten hours. in other words, in a real world sense, if i'm in a certain area on the border and the relief that is going to relieve me for today calls in sick, the agency could call me up and say, hey,

your relief just called in sick, we didn't schedule this to happen. we need you to work a double shift. by the way, that double shift is now going to be free. so, we needed a -- we needed a mechanism to ensure that the agency was not going to work us beyond ten hours per day and work us for free, and that's what this legislation does. this gives us what we call back end protections to ensure that we get compensated for the work that we do. >> okay. thanks. i have another question. in fact, i have a couple more. let me use my time and i'll yield back to you, senator tester, if you'd like to take more time. a question on operational tempo, the number of shifts worked per day if i could. and i think i'll probably address these couple of questions to you in this regard, mr. cotello. i understand that one of the most widespread misuses of

administratively uncontrollable overtime at the border patrol has been to pay for the extra time it takes employees to transition from one shift to another and this has allowed the border patrol to use three -- i'm told three ten hour shifts at many locations rather than four eight-hour shifts. in fact, the office of special counsel noted in its written testimony that border patrol, this is a quote, i think, managers insist that employing three ten-hour shifts is a more cost-effective approach to securing the border even if administratively uncontrollable overtime may not properly be used for routine activities. that's a quote. and a couple of questions if i could. mr. kellogg, i'd like to ask you to explain why the border patrol believes that using three shifts instead of four is a more cost effective approach to securing the border? >> so i agree with the managers in san diego who pointed that

out in these -- in those interviews. in an ideal setting 24/7 seven-day a week workload along the border you would have to transition between shifts however they are, and it's better to have three with the overhead, the managers and the supervisors versus four or five to predict and then schedule that overlap. it's better to have a three-shift model. when you have a three-shift model, the shifts have to transfer information to each other before one starts and the other -- and people have to be relieved. under the current system auo is not designed -- is not -- the rubric doesn't allow for relief to be paid for using auo. so whatever system we went going forward, it's always better to have three shifts than four. you have better capability that way but you would still need to figure out how to transfer that knowledge and that means time. >> let me just follow up on this. you address this in part but i'm going to ask it anyway. what would be the impact on your operations and your ability to secure the border if you were

forced to move to four shifts across the border as a result of not being able to use administratively and controllable overtime to pay for shift changes? >> you would just need more agents to do the same amount of work. we would prefer and it's most advantageous to the organization in predicting costs and future stability to have three shifts than four. it's more cost effective. you have to hire the more agents to get the same coverage across the same time period. >> finally, how will the tester-mccain bill we're considering today impact your ability to schedule the shifts at the border. >> what's contemplated here, it will allow this model to compensation people for that relief. there are also lots of missions that occur after the shift is over, transferring information, landmarking apprehensions, developing trends to inform the next day's deployment, the next

shift's deployment, the trends that are happening in real time. we want them to record that at the end of their shift so the next shift is smarter about where they place their assets and how supervisors move people from one side of a deployment area to another. so you need to have that transfer of knowledge, you need that overlap not only for the physical presence but for the information and the rapid response that's required based on the information that they develop while in their shift. >> thanks much. senator tester? >> thank you, mr. chairman. i want to thank each one of the witnesses today for your testimony and for your straightforward answers. i would just like to say it is -- it is seldom in the u.s. senate that we get a bill that makes a situation simpler, that the agencies want, that then people that are employed by the agencies want, that saves money,

that increases efficiency, that increases predictability, and we don't throw it out of here as quick as we can. we have a problem. i think all four of the witnesses have pointed out what the problem is. and i think that if the senate does what it does so very well, and that is talk it to death and delay it to death, we won't get this problem solved. and the ultimate thing that will happen if we don't get this solved, the borders will be lessee secure, we'll be looking around pointing at you guys saying, why didn't you do this, why didn't do you that, when in fact it's our obligation to make sure you have the tools to do your job to protect the border in the way you know how it needs to be protected. with that, mr. chairman, i would say that we are in the first or

second week in june. if we don't get this bill out of committee and if things go upside down on our border, we can reconvene this committee of homeland security and talk about how we have screwed up. with that, mr. chairman, i whether ask you when will there be a markup on this bill? >> i'm going to cone 49fer with coburn -- >> later this week we should have a markup. >> let me make it very, very clear. this is not something we should screw around with. we've got people out here watching us on cspan now wanting to know what we're going to do. we've got folks who work for cbp that like their job, are proud

of their job, and that if we don't set some certainty down for these folks, they're going to go to work somewhere else. we need to fix it so it can be audited, so that we know what we're doing and so that these folks have some predictability. we can put it off to the end of the month, but keep in mind, the longer we put this off, we have to get it off the senate floor, we've got to see if the house can get it done and then we need to get it implemented and time is awaiting. we have 11 weeks left. >> i think, senator tester, you know there's been a lot of discussion about whether or not this bill saves as much money as we're told it might, there might be available to serve as an offset to strengthen our cyber alliance within the department of homeland security. believe me, i understand the need to move it along. >> mr. chairman, i would tell you if this bill doesn't save one thin dime, if it's revenue neutral, we ought to do it. >> fair enough. i hope it saves more than a few

thin dimes. i thanks very much for all the work you and your staff have done and senator mccain. we'll put our heads together and talk this week. if we can do it early this week, we'll do it early this week. >> i'm free tomorrow afternoon just so you know. >> all right. that's good. i'm getting your drift. all right. this might be my last question. it deals with the surge that we've seen in unauthorized migration from central america, particularly the record numbers of unaccompanied minors that are coming and the effect they're having on the border patrol's ability to carry out their mission. the surge we're seeing, this is a quote, compromising dhs's capabilities to address other

transborder capabilities such as human smuggling, trafficking, drugs, commercial and financial operations. who is this -- from vitello, i'm going to ask you to please expand on this for us if you would. what exactly has the impact of this current surge in unauthorized migration been on the border patrol's capacity to carry out its mission? start with that and then i'll ask a second question. >> so as it relates to the conditions specifically in the rio grande valley, we are facing the situation where the facilities that are available for -- the eight stations that are in the valley are insufficiently large enough to accommodate the people who we find ourselves arresting and so given the time frame that we

need to book people in and to treat juveniles via the statute to turn them over to hhs before the 72-hour clock runs out, we were unsufficiently prepared to do that given the space that's available there. that's why the secretary immediately designated it as a level 4 event, made myself the coordinator for the dhs response and liaison with the inner agency and then the president since has designated it since as a humanitarian event and put administrator fugate into the federal coordinator role to drive more resources. as we started to the valley to do what fema calls wrap around services for our facilities in the valley and then to -- to make the system work more efficiently, to have more placement for these children. and what it means to the operations down there is that we have -- we were using

enforcement resources in order to do this care and to make these facilities as safe and as useful as possible and to provide the right city setting for the people who were in custody. that help is down range considerably. it's changed considerably since the end of may and early june and since the president's designation as administrator fugate to coordinate the inner agency, it's gotten much better. we were concerned, the text that you speak of is a draft that my staff had prepared for me. we had not sent it to the inner agency coordinating group but it was a concern that has been existed in the valley for a while and we've moved forward to fix that since the time of the writing. >> let me move forward. i understand that due to budgetary constraints in the past couple of years the border patrol has had to reduce the amount of hours worked by its agents to reduce overtime costs. what impact has this had on

woi border patrol's capacity. we've seen other threats in the border patrol region and i think you've addressed this at least in part. if you want to take another shot at it, then i'm going to ask mr. judd if he would share his thoughts with us, too. >> so in late '12 we looked at the '13 and '14 budget picture before sequestration and looked at the savings based on our emerging awareness and understanding of the challenge that we had with the auo rubric. we decided we could take some risks in reducing hours in order to drive savings from those accounts. we decided in '13 to do that as an experiment to see how well we could monitor what is by statute uncontrollable. i think we did a fair amount of that. before and after sequester that made that ultimately more difficult. in '13 we derive more savings but what that means is shrinking hours of agent deployment. the overlaps, you go from a three-shift model to four-shift

model or more and then you're pulling hours out of the work force in order not to make flsa pag payments to agents. we think the risks we were taking were adequate and substantial but manageable. in the situation that as it relates to rgb, we recognize that can't be the way forward. the work step that's down there and in other places, we can't continue to do that. we've reduced those costs to meet the targets in '13 and a ste tempted to do the same in '14. that's just not an acceptable risk anymore. >> mr. judd, any thoughts on this? >> absolutely. to those watching on cspan to keep this in layman's terms, what we're seeing with this surge that's coming over in rgb, it's pulling agents out of the field. they're no longer patrolling the border. they're having to deal with this huge influx of minors that are

coming in and they're having to process them, they're having to watch them, they're having to feed them, they're having to do all of these different things instead of actually being out and patrolling the border. not only is that happening in rgb, but because they don't have the facilities to manage the influx of crossings, they're now sending them to places like el paso, the tucson sector. what that's doing, that's also pulling resources out of the field, border patrol agents out of the field that would normally be patrolling the border and they're having to do the same thing, having to process these illegal aliens, having to watch them, having to feed them, having to take care of all of the needs while they're in our custody. what it's doing, it's straining to the breaking point the number of agents we're able to deploy out to the field and it's hurting us. >> all right. thanks. how will the tester-mccain bill address this issue or these issues? >> specifically the hours

past -- the flsa is not part of the remuneration going forward. straight ten hours would give us more capability. it's given us 1500 more agents. it allows us to flex in that overlap, it allows us to have a core capability across the force so i don't have to shrink hours in order to reduce the payments, that budget picture. >> in essence, you'll be paying me the same amount of money to work ten hours as what you're currently paying me to work 9.3 hours, that's where the additional 1,000, 1200 agents comes in. because you're paying me flsa right now, i'm evenly able to work 9.3 hours because we have an overtime budget. we can't exceed that. senator mccain and senator tester bill will allow me to work 10 hours for the exact same

amount of pay of what i would work at 9.3, 9.25 hours. >> okay. last question i have is -- relates to something dr. coburn said to me early in the hearing, and it dealt with calculation of pension benefits for those that are working under this kind of arrangement -- pay arrangement. and he suggested that it would save ---or he thought it would save money in the near term but in the long term may cost money because of additional pension payments. can somebody just speak to that? in fact, all of you are welcome to address that if you like. mr. miles, do you have anything you want to say on that front? >> no, sir. >> okay. mr. hamrick? >> no, sir. >> why not? >> i have nothing to add, sir. >> all right. mr. judd? >> that's absolutely incorrect. our pension right now is based upon 25% auo plus our base pay.

this would -- this would keep everything exactly the same. this wouldn't change anything, it wouldn't cost more, it wouldn't cost less. the pension would be the same. >> all right. chief? >> it isn't a change as it relates to auo payments or other statutes that are out there like l.e.a.p. >> okay. i think we're going to wrap it up here. i think we start some votes and -- in the senate and i think with that i want to thank each of you for coming today and thanks for making time to be with us on probably short notice, one of you at least very short notice. and we appreciate your testimony. we appreciate your answering our questions. the hearing record is going to remain open for 15 days. that's until june 24th at 5:00 p.m. for the submission of statements and questions for the record. i'm going to urge my colleagues who have any additional questions to submit them well before june 24th so that we can get very prompt answers to those questions.

but with that having been said, it's been a good hearing and i'm appreciative of the time that's been invested by our witnesses, by staff, and by the members. this hearing is adjourned. thanks so much. and ahead this week in congress the senate returns in about half an hour from now, 2:00 eastern time, with votes at 5:30 on judicial nominations. later this week in the senate, spending bills for commerce, justice, and science and agriculture. live coverage of the senate on cspan 2. the house returns tomorrow taking up bills under suspension of the rules including naming post offices and other buildings. later on in the week a bill dealing with vaebs health care. you can watch the house on cspan. in the house, republicans will be holding leadership elections. kevin mccarthy and raul labrador are up for the soon to be

vacated seat of eric cantor. he'll be stepping down next month after losing his district primary. the race will pit mr. mccarthy's top deputy peter roskin of ill know against steve skalese. fellow rsc member marlin stutsman is vying for the whip position. we expect to see leadership positions held on wednesday. the senate committee held a hearing on the security of radiological materials that could be used on the making of dirty bombs. including the nuclear regulatory commission, the homeland security department, and the national nuclear security administration. they discussed their current efforts and their vulnerabilities. >> hearing will come to order. a little over a year ago the

city of boston as you will recall was struck by a tragedy during the running of the 117th boston marathon. two terrorists detonated pressure cooker bombs near the finish line. as you'll recall they killed three people, they injured nearly 300 more. the horror of this attack which we viewed again and again on television and again on the first anniversary of the attack will never be forgotten, but neither will be the heroism that unfolded immediately following those attacks. police, medical personnel, national guards men and women, volunteers, runners and spectators all ran toward the blast, toward the blast to provide immediate aid to the injured. these acts of courage and selflessness saved countless lives. the tragic events of the 117th running of the boston marathon remind us that we must

constantly seek to counter the threats, anticipate the threats from home-grown terrorists and to improve our nation's ability to anticipate and prevent the next attack. today as we strive to improve our counter terrorism efforts we have the opportunity to look back at the boston marathon bombing and ask ourselves this question, what if the attack had occurred differently? what if it was even more deadly? what if the pressure cooker bombs weren't just simply bombs but dirty bombs? the last question is what we're going to focus on today in this hearing. dirty bomb is any kind of crude explosive device that when detonated dispurses radiation around the blast. the dirty bomb goes off. those who survive the blast can be exposed to harmful amounts of radiation that could cause sickness or even death.

moreover, a dirty bomb could ender areas uninhabitable not just for days, weeks, months but for years making that particular weapon a highly disruptive weapon. the boston marathon terrorists had turned their pressure cooker bombs into dirty bombs and the consequences of that tragic date could have been multiplied by an order of magnitude. i want us to think about that for a minute. for instance, when those police, medical personnel, volunteers, riders and spectators all ran towards the blast to help the injured, what if they had been unknowingly exposed to harmful amounts of radiological material? in many cases this material cannot be seen as we know, cannot be smelled, could not be felt, could not be tasted. in this hypothetical what would have been a heroic display of selflessness could have spread to a more deadly and disruptive

situation. today's hearing will focus on how we can ensure that this hypothetical situation does not come to pass. we'll focus on the threat of a dirty bomb and specifically examine the security of radiological material here in communities across our country that could be used to create a dirty bomb. two years ago at the request of then senator danny acocca, good friend to us all, general accountability office issued a report examining the government's efforts to secure radiological material in u.s. medical facilities. j.o. found that in many cases this radiological material was all too vulnerable to threat or sabotage. shortly thereafter i joined he and senator casey in requesting the gao audit, the security of radiological material used at construction and industrial

sites. unlike the radiological devices in hospitals that are stationary and large, industrial radiological sources are often found in small, highly portable devices routinely used in open populated areas and we have in the poster over here an example of the kind of highly portable radiological device that we're talking about. this is a radiography camera. it's a camera that's commonly used at construction sites to survey pipes and foundations for cracks and imperfections. these cameras contain radiological material that if seized by the wrong hands could be used to help create a dirty bomb. as clearly as the type of portable device that a thief or terrorist could walk away with

if they found it left unsecured. gao will testify today on the security of industrial radiological material like this camera, but the messages from the audit are clear. despite government efforts, industrial radiological resources are far too vulnerable to theft or sabotage by terrorists or others wishing to do us harm. in fact, gao found four cases where potentially dirty bomb material was stolen between 2006 and 2012 and more over gao found two cases where individuals with extensive criminal history were given unsupervised access to potential dirty bomb material, one of those individuals had previously been convicted of making terroristic threats. we'll learn more about these vulnerabilities and i think we're going to learn a little bit, maybe some common sense fixes from our friends at gao. but let me just say this, we've

got to do better. we've got to do better than this. given the consequences of a dirty bomb, there really is no excuse for the kind of vulnerabilities identified by the general accountability office. i'll say it again, we've just got to do better. if we're to protect against the next oklahoma city bombing, the next 9/11 or the next boston marathon bombing, we need to stay several steps ahead of the terrorists. we must anticipate and neutralize their evolving ability to carry outer or list plots well before they're ever conceived and executed. today we'll also hear from three agencies that play a critical role in securing radiological materials in the u.s. and preventing dirty bomb attacks from occurring. and with that, we're going to turn to our panel and i'm going to make some brief introductions of each of you and then we'll invite you to present your

testimony and i will ask some questions and some of my colleagues will drift in and out, ask questions as well, and then by the time it will be time for dinner, hopefully we'll be done sooner than that. but i want to welcome each of you for joining us today. thank you for coming. thank you for your preparation for this hearing and for your willingness to respond to our questions. the honorable ann harrington is the deputy administrator for defense, nuclear nonproliferation for a national nuclear security administration. did that fit on a business card? barely. that's a lot. a position you've held, i understand, since, what, 2010? 2010. thank you. prior to national nuclear security administration she served as the director of the national academy of sciences committee on arms control. she has also held positions in state department as acting director and deputy director of the office of proliferation threat reduction. welcome. next on our panel we have dr.

hubin. i'm going to ask you to pronounce your name. let me try it. i want you to pronounce it for us. gawadia. is that right? director gawadia. great name. director of the domestic nuclear detection office at the department of homeland security. she was appointed director in september of 2013 after being acting director since 2012. welcome. i understand you served in multiple positions at the domestic nuclear detection office in 2005 and prior to that worked at the department of homeland security science and technology directorate. the transportation security administration and the federal aviation administration. our next witness on this panel is mr. mark setorious, executive director of operations at the u.s. nuclear regulatory

commission. in that role he serves as a chief operating officer. he joined the nf rc 25 years ago as an operating licensing examiner and then as a reactor inspector and senior project engineer. he's a u.s. naval academy graduate, served as the officer in the u.s. navy's nuclear power program and is a nuclear trained submarine officer. thank you for that service, too. final witness this morning is mr. david tremble who serves as a director of the natural resources and environmental group at the u.s. government accountability office. mr. tremble is a primary author of the gao report underlining the threat presented by the security of domestic industrial radiological sources. his current role he provides leadership and oversight on nuclear security and cleanup issues.

previously has focused on environmental causes including controlling environmental substances, clean water and epa management. before joining gao in 2009 he served at the department of state's political military affairs bureau where he was responsible for export compliance and enforcement issues. those are the introductions. i'm sure they don't do justice to each of you, but we're delighted that you're here and that you're willing to help better inform this committee and hopefully the senate with the potential threats that face us and what we might do about them. ms. harrington, please proceed. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and thank you for giving me the opportunity to testify on the department of energy national nuclear security administration efforts to enhance the security of vulnerable high-risk radioactive sources in the united states. i would like to thank you for your continued interest and the interest of the committee and its leadership on this important issue.

i would also like to thank my colleagues from the department of homeland security and the nuclear regulatory commission for being constructive and indispensable partners in the effort to reduce the risk of radiological incidences. the office of defense nuclear nonproliferation which i lead in conjunction with our federal, local and industry partners works to enhance the security of civilian radioactive materials in the united states and internationally. i have provided details on our programs in my written testimony. we do appreciate the comments and recommendations from the general accountability office and we are actively implementing their recommendations to expand outreach to increase the number of program volunteers and enhance coordination with other federal agencies. i want to use the time allotted for my oral remarks to look at the path forward and at the strategic approach we are developing to address the challenges of securing the materials that can be used in a dirty bomb. the importance of securing high risk radiological sources was

highlighted at the 2014 nuclear security summit when the united states and 22 other countries signed on to a so-called gift basket committing to secure all international atomic energy agency classified category one radioactive materials at a level that meets or where possible exceeds the guidelines of the agency's code of conduct on the safety and security of radioactive sources. the goal is to accomplish this by the 2016 nuclear summit. the recent theft in mexico of a truck carrying large cobalt 60 source demonstrates how much we depend on the security outside our borders. commitments like those under the nuclear security summit process contribute in a meaningful way not just to the security of individual countries but to our joint security. while we continue to proceed with implementation of security

enhancements for high risk radioactive materials, several factors have led us to consider a new strategic approach to addressing the dirty bomb threat through actions that achieve more permanent and sustainable threat reduction. factors that we considered include the large number of radioactive sources worldwide, the fact that we secure or retire existing sources even as new sources and new devices are being introduced, the long-term cost for sustaining security systems, the limited options for disposal of these sources and the general constraints within the federal budgets. the grand challenge we should consider is how we can achieve permanent risk reduction rather than continuing in the current preventive posture. just as we have demonstrated that highly enriched uranium or heu is not necessarily for producing critical medical isotopes and that we can

eliminate heu from that technology cycle, can we apply the same principle to radiological sources? we should strive to not only further enhance security but reduce the size and complexity of the overall problem and achieve permanent threat reduction by decreasing the number of sites and devices that require the high activity radioactive materials. the center piece of this strategy is to engage in a worldwide effort to provide reliable nonradioactive alternatives to the highest activity radioactive sources that pose the greatest risk or to find ways to reduce the amounts of material needed for a given function. we will need to have the engagement and active participations from the research industry and medical communities but the potential benefits, removing the risk of a dirty bomb all together, are significant. considering the range of

incentives for replacement where commercially viable all turn na tifs exist is something we are investigating and we are also collaborating with our research and development office to explore and assess technical improvements that could be developed and transferred to industry for commercialization. we recognize, however, that we may not succeed in replacing the need for all sources. for example, radioactive industrial sources such as mobile well logging and radiography sources may not have an acceptable and viable alternative. in such cases we are collaborating with industry partners to develop innovative and sustainable security solutions. we have seen that other countries are willing to go above and beyond international norms and standards for radiological security through collaboration with our programs and through commitments they have made at the nuclear security summit. we have also now seen

domestically that some agreement states have taken radiological security to a higher level. while we have an important role to play in this regard, we also encourage all other states to show the same initiative to demonstrate leadership and commit resources to take radiological security beyond minimum requirements. thank you for your attention and i am happy to answer any questions. thank you so much. thanks for your testimony. thanks for your service. dr. gawadia, would you please present your testimony at this time. thank you. >> thank you, chairman. good morning, and i would extend thanks also for holding this hearing. it is tai good opportunity for us to appear today to present to you and discuss with you the office's efforts to prevent and prepare for radiological events. i am honored to be here today to

testify with my distinguished colleagues. their support and assistance are fundamental to the office you've given to my office. we are singularly focused on the nuclear threat and seek to make nuclear terrorism a prohibitively difficult undertaking for our adversaries. in coordination with federal, state and local partners we develop and enhance the global nuclear architecture which is the framework for detecting, and liedsing and reporting on nuclear and other materials out of control. although my office focuses on detecting and locating radioactive materials once they are stolen, we work closely with the agent sits who are responsible for the safety and security of these materials. our approach to detection is based on the critical triad of intelligence, law enforcement and technology by ensuring intelligent informed operations are conducted by well-trained

operators using the right technologies we maximize our abilities to detect these threats. the first leg, intelligence and information sharing, is very frankly the back bone of a robust detection architecture. timely and accurate warnings are crucial to the deployment of resources and operations. additionally, we analyze past smuggling cases and terror events and bring this to bear on the future of architecture developments and sis 2e78s. our office's joint analysis center enables information sharing and also provides alarm a judy case support and situational awareness. to increase the awareness we regularly public informational bulletins for our state and local partners summarizing relevant use articles with useful facts about radiological materials. the second leg of our triad is law enforcement, those on the front lines of detention and

prevention efforts. our office works to ensure that they have the necessary capabilities and are well-trained and ready for the mission. since 2005 through many collaborative efforts we have provided radiation detection to over 27,000 emergency and local offices. they stress operator's abilities to detect illicit activities. to date the domestic nuclear detection office has engaged with 29 states to raise awareness of this threat and we assist our state and local partners as they develop their own detection programs. we work with them to build a flexible, multi--layered architecture that can be integrated in the federal assets into a unified response in the event of a credible threat. by the end of 2015 we will have exparnded these efforts to cover all 50 states.

we further support law enforcement's operation by deploying mobile operation units. we support national security and -- national and other special security events. the program was instituted in 2008 and the trailers house equipment for up to 40 personnel. in fact, this year on july 4th we will complete our 150th deployment of the mobile detection unit. the final leg of our triad is technology. in addition to acquiring and deploying radiation censors for the department of homeland security's operational component, we maintain an applied area. we collaborate with several research partners to bring the right technologies to front line operators. operators are always included in all of our efforts. for instance, we recently led

the development of the next generation hand held radioactive identification device. these are readily used by law enforcement and technical experts in the field. we work closely with our operational partners to identify key requirements in the design of the system. the final product is light weight, easy to use and more reliable. it has lower life cycle costs. with your support we will continue such collaborative efforts to offer significant operational improvements and enhance our national detection capabilities. thank you again for this opportunity to discuss the efforts to pro tektd our nation from radiological and nuclear threats. i sincerely appreciate your efforts and support. your leadership and our collaboration will help us ensure a safe, secure and resilient homeland. >> thank you so much, doctor. please proceed. when you left the navy, how many years had you served?

>> five years of active duty, sir, and then 18 years of reserve service. >> okay. and 18 years reserve service. that was 23 years? >> yes, sir. >> that's how many years i served. five active, 18 reserve. and i was a navy p-3 commander and our job was to track soviet nuclear subs. we did a lot of low level missions off of vietnam. the island in the south china seas. >> yes, sir. you often spent time looking for u.s. submarines without as much success. >> no, we were not stupid enough to try to look. we knew we couldn't find them. they were so quiet and the way we found them, as you know, was through sound, but very proud of your service there and are you a retired captain? >> yes, i'm a retard captain. >> so am i. captain, my son been calls me captain my captain. how do i say, as you were,

sailor. captain, welcome. >> thank you. good morning, chairman carper. i appreciate the opportunity to appear before you today on behalf of the u.s. nuclear regulatory commission or nrc. radiological source security has been and continues to be a top priority at the nrc. the nrc continues to work with the 37 agreement states and domestic and international organizations on a variety of initiatives to make risk significant radioactive sources even more secure and less vulnerable. the events of september 11, 2001 changed the threat environment and resulted in significant strengthening of security of radioactive sources. immediately following 911 the nrc working with other federal and state agencies prioritized actions to enhance the security of radioactive sources. these initial actions resulted in the nrc having several licensees to communicate general

threat legislation and recommend significant actions to address potential threats. once nrc identified actions that licensees needed to take to enhance the security and control of risk significant orders that imposed legally binding requirements on our licensees. in addition, as mandated by the energy policy act of 2005, the nrc convened an interagency task force on radioactive source protection and security to evaluate and provide recommendations to the president and the congress relating to the security of radiation sources in the united states from potential terrorist threats. this task force submitted its first report to the president and congress in august of 2006, concluding that there were no significant gaps in the areas of radioactive source protection and security. the second task force report was provided if august of 2010 and the third report will be submit the this august. at a hearing held july 12th,

2007 by the permanent subcommittee on investigations of this committee, a web-based licensing verification system was discussed. in an effort to better track transactions of radioactive material nationally, the nrc developed a portfolio of automated tools to verify licenses and track credentials, inspections, devices and sources and events. this portfolio includes the national source tracking system, the web-based licensing system and the license verification system. the nrc also seized relying on the presumption that applicants for a license were acting in good faith. and instead, instituted a policy by which the nrc and the agreement states would ver fy the legitimacy of applicants when first dealing with them. we also issued pre-licensing guidance that includes various applicant and licensee screening activities and site visits to ensure radioactive sources will

be used as intended. the nrc also has implemented a process called the integrated materials performance evaluation program or impep. the program provides the nrc with a systematic integrated and reliable evaluation of the strengths and weaknesses of the respective programs and it provides an indication of areas in which the nrc and agreement states should dedicate more resources or management attention. through a significant collaborative effort between the nrc and agreement states the agency developed a radioactive source security rule making to replace the earlier orders. and provide requirements on -- to a broad set of licensees. this rule making was informed by insights, gained through the implementation of the orders. the resulting rule is an

optimized mix of performance based and prescriptive requirements that provide the framework for a licensee to develop a security program for risk significant materials with measures specifically tailored to it fas silly. compliance with the rule was required for nrc licensees by march 19th, 2014. agreement state licensees need to fulfill compatible requirements by march 2016. the nrc's efforts in material security have not ended with the publication and implementation of our radioactive source security rule. the nrc will continue to assess its programs to ensure that they promote the secure use and management of radioactive sources. this concludes my remarks, senator, and i'll be happy to respond to any questions you may have. >> captain, thanks so much. david trimble, nice to see david. thanks for joining us.

thanks for all you guys do at jao to help our country. >> my testimony today discusses the challenges federal agencies face in security industrial radiological sources in the united states and the steps agencies are taking to improve security. the potential vulnerability of radiological sources was highlighted last december when a truck in mexico carrying a cobalt 60 source, a high-risk radiological source was stolen. in our report being issued today we examine two types of radiological sources mobile and stationary. we found both posed security challenges even when licensees follow nrc security controls. the size and portability of mobile sources makes them particularly challenging. iea officials have stated that the transportation of high risk sources is of most vulnerable part of the nuclear and radiological supply chain. nrc requirements to ensure security for those mobile forces require framework to be implemented by the licensee. while orders calling on

licensees to secure these sources they do not explain how to do this by, for example, specifying the robustness of locks that must be used or alarms being installed in trucks carrying mobile sources. while all 15 radio graphy companies we visited met nrc security requirements we found great variation in the security measures employed with some companies using only the most basic of locks to secure these sources. the risk to these mobile sources is underscored by four incidents of theft, all after nrc instituted controls in 2005. in addition to these thefts we identify two incidents where individuals claiming to be state inspectors approached the crew while in the field in one case the individual was wearing a jacket with a logo of the state. this person gained access to the truck, sought detailed information about the source, and left with two accomplices only after the crew made calls to confirm his identity. regarding stationary sources these typically involve

aerospace manufacturing plants, storage warehouses and radiators. while all of the 33 facilities we visited met nrc security requirements some facilities still appeared to have vulnerabilities. nine had unsecured skylights, one had an exterior roll top door open and unattended and the wall of the cage inside where the cameras were stored did not go to the ceiling. another facilitator had an ir radiator secured with a pad lock. in addition to these potential vulnerabilities we found some facilities that separately secure their high risk sources such as logging companies do not have to comply with nrc increased security requirements. licensees of both mobile and stationary sources also face challenges in determining which employees are suitable for trust worthiness and reliability certification, which is required by nrc before an employee is given unescorted access to high risk sources. the certification is intended to

mitigate the risk of an insider threat. which nsa has stated is the primary threat to facilities with high risk radiological sources. under nrc security controls it is left to the licensee to decide whether to grant employees unescorted access even in cases where an individual has been convicted of a violent crime or making terroristic threats. about half of the 33 licensees we visited said they face challenges in making this determination and seven stated they had granted a tnr certification to individuals with criminal convictions giving them unescorted access. one example the individual had been arrested and convicted multiple times of assault, forgery, failure to appear in court, driving while intoxicated, driving with a suspended license and twice for terroristic threats. notably the two convictions for terroristic threats were not included in the background information provided by nrc to the licensee. according to nrc this person was not convicted of threats against the united states, but of making

violent verbal threats against two individuals. our report also examined the steps federal agencies are taking to better secure industrial radiological sources and nsa has a program to install enhanced security measures at facilities containing high risk sources and they have research projects to track mobile sources if lost or stolen. in addition at the time of our review nrc was preparing security best practices guide for licensees. our report includes recommendations to nrc to review and consider advising the tnr process and reexamine the regulatory gap that exempts sh from the increased security requirements. i would be happy to answer any questions you may have. >> david, thank you so much. i think we have a couple of photos here that have been enlarged and i'm going to ask if i could, mr. trimble, for you to respond to a couple questions. i think your report included in it a number of visuals that were -- especially interesting. we have taken i think three of

those photos and put them on these large charts and i'm going to just present each of these three to you in sequence. i want to ask you to describe the photo and the security concern that it represents. here's the first one. what is the photo of? >> this is a -- one of the sites we visited. this aware house storing raid graphy cameras and the potential security vulnerability we identified in this is the large door is obviously left open and unattended. >> all right. and what's -- what is inside that might be of interest? >> these are the raid graphy cameras you had the earlier pictures of . the warehouse would be the central location these cameras would be stored when not out in the field being used. >> inside could it be a two or three or maybe a couple dozen? >> yes. there could be any number of cameras located inside and they would be in this case, they --

they would be in a storage room and behind a locked container so meeting -- because they were in a locked container they're meeting the nrc security requirements. not with standing the open door and unattended nature of that door. >> okay. the -- any idea how many of those handheld devices would be required if someone knew how to handle radioactive materials to actually create a weapon of a real concern? >> i think i would defer to our colleagues at the table here but i believe one would be sufficient. >> okay. let's look at the next photo. please. and what do we have here? >> so this is inside one of the storage warehouses for those radio graphfy cameras. as you can see while there is a cage lock on the door, the door

and the wall next to it don't go all the way to the ceiling. which -- so, you know, it's rather impact barrier. now again, the inside of there, the cameras were in a locked container and that is how -- so not with standing the vulnerability there they're able to meet the requirements of the nrc. >> janet inapproprianapolitano secretary of homeland security as you recall and i remember sitting here at this table talking about border security and we were talking about building along the mexican border with the u.s. a fence or fences and walls. she said something to the effect of i build a 20- foot fence, somebody will come along with a 25-foot ladder. looking at this reminds me of that. i think we have maybe one more photo that's been enlarged and placed. maybe you can tell us about that

photo. and what do we have here? >> so this is a picture of a skylight and at nine locations we visited, we had unsecured -- identified unsecured skylights a the facility. these facilities range from warehouses storing radio graphy cameras to scientific research facilities to large panoramic eradiators. there are quite a range of facilities that had these vulnerabilities. notably, i believe in the nsa program where they go in on a voluntary basis and beef up security, skylights is one of the areas which they would target in terms of either closing the means of ingress or securing the skylight. >> the -- can you tell us whether the building where the skylight exists, were the

devices that we're talking about here, were they locked up in a secure facility? >> yes. they're still meeting the requirements because they would still be in a locked container inside the facility but the skylight from our view as a potential vulnerability because it provides another way of getting inside the building to gain access to that container. >> yeah. as we all know, there are locked contain e containers and some are not very secure, others are quite secure. can you comment on that please. >> we saw that i think most pointedly looking at the trucks, the radio graphy travel in with their mobile sources. some of these trucks were secured with simple pad locks. some had high security locks and inside the dark rooms where the cameras would be stored sometimes people would have just an army surplus container with a

cable securing it to the truck which provided the second lock required under the requirements. some took the mission more seriously, bought sort of reinforced steel containers and bolted it down and done much more of a job to secure those containers. it's great variability is what we observed in the field. >> let me ask the other panelists to react to what we've seen and what mr. trimble has said. any thoughts before i ask a different question? no. captain satorius? >> i would just say, that this is the first i've seen of these pictures. i have been made aware of issues that the gao has found within their report. being an organization that always strives to continually improve, we have a new security rule which i mentioned. we will look at that rule and

see if there are things we need to beef up. we as a regulatory body put regulations in place that are risk informed and performance based and we do not typically have a one rule fits all that we leave it to the licensees to. it's their responsibility to take our requirements and put their program into a place and ensure that they're complying with our regulations. now we do provide with rules guidance that will instruct licensees on how they can construct and operate their program in a manner that will comply with our regulatory requirements but we leave it to the licensee to put their program in place to document a written security plan to -- i've had to understand the security zone on some of these pictures to understand completely all the

details, but i wanted to provide that short perspective. >> okay. good. is this an honor system that's in place, basically self- --s. >> no. >> policing compliance? >> we also inspect these facilities and where we have compliance problems where they do not comply with our regulatory requirements, we have an enforcement program that can issue violations, civil penalties, orders that will modify or revoke their license if necessary so we have a very robust enforcement program. and we -- like i say, we inspect these facilities on a period that aligns with the potential danger that might befall a member of the public if they were to be exposed. and our inspection program is quite robust. i'm a former inspector myself. it's about a year program that has formal classes that have to

be taken and passed successfully. there's there's a -- many on the job type accompaniments as you perform these inspection instruction activities and then finally, you're qualified as an inspector through an oral board. so it's a rigorous program and only inspectors can perform these sort of reviews of licensees. >> did you say the regulation had been updated recently? >> yes. >> give us just a flavor for how it was changed? >> what we did was i had mentioned in the 2005 time frame we had done an assessment since 9/11 and looked at what things we needed to make regulatory requirements and what we typically do is we will issue orders that modifies their

license and has the perform certain activities. we'll then take a little longer and go through the rule-making process which is a two to three-year process involves outreach to stakeholders and members of the public to help nous that rule-making endeavor and so that process took place and we issued that regulation in march of this year. it involves, as you've heard, a background check to ensure that individuals that are allowed to have access by themselves, that they're trustworthy and reliable. the licensee performance that review. and makes the determination as to whether the individual meets the trustworthy and reliable. we also have issued a -- which my colleague here had indicated we issued a guidance document of the best practices for

performing these type of reviews so that the individual that's responsible for making that call, has guidance on what to look for and what things to -- the other thing that requires is a liaison with local law enforcement so you have a plan that if if in the course of the required detecting and assessing and responding to the potential theft of a source, you have to lay out plan with local law enforcement so that they can respond. they're required to inform the nrc. they call the local law enforcement first and required to call us as soon as they're done with that so we get early notification so that we can outreach to our federal partners to make sure that this lost or stolen source has actually been

j ob sounded with. >> can you give us an idea of how oftens these reports to police and the nrc come in for devices that are missing or believed to be stolen? >> i would say several a month. and the vast majority of those, all but -- in the last since 2005, 2010, 1112, and 13 there has been no category one source lost or stolen. for category 2 sources -- >> give us idea of what a category 1 is as opposed to a category 2. >> the iaea standards and their code of conduct identifies category 1 sources as if not

safely managed, or secured, likely to cause permanent injury to a person what handled them or was in contact with them. it would probably be fatal to be close to this amount of unshielded material of a period of a few minutes to an hour. that's the most -- and these sources are used in ir radiators and they're strong sources, they tend to be cobalt 60. category 2 is one step down from that, where if you were in close contact to it for an hour or two, there would be serious injury and possibly a fatality. >> i would assume that for category 1 devices, that the level of risk would be higher. >> yes. >> and the requirement for securing the device would be greater and maybe even inspections would occur more often. give us an idea of how often inspections would occur for the

different categories. >> annually for category 1 sources. >> and for the other categories. >> it varies. some are a period of every two or three years depending upon the strength of the material and its potential to harm members of the public. i will say also for category 1 sources, our part 37, the new rule, requires that any time the source is removed from its storage container it sets off an alarm. so that's -- it's a new requirement that was in part 37. >> and is that for category 1 devices. >> yes. >> let me ask our panel, the panelist, would you just comment on the rule that captain just described? what do you feel -- what should we be encouraged by, concerned about? please, any of you. david? >> well, as we note in our report, our site visits were

assessing the current rules, part 37 didn't kick in for nrc led states until this year and it won't rule out for states until 2016. what i would highlight, however, is many of the problems we're identifying in our report i don't believe would be addressed. for example, the issue of location where some sites are able to not be subject to the security requirements because they're separately stored, therefore they're not totalled up to hit the regulatory threshold that triggers enhanced security. i do not believe that's addressed. some of the specificity we've talked about in terms of types of locks for category 2 sources i don't believe is addressed. then the issue about trust worthiness and reliability certification and the process by which that is done, i do not believe is addressed. so the decision is still being left to the licensee and there's no process or criteria that would disqualify someone from

being given such a certification and no process by which say, for example, say you had a conviction or a red flag, that would trigger a greater nrc involvement. >> miss harrington, dr. gowadia, would you react to what mr. trimble just said? >> i would like to take perhaps one of his points just very briefly, actually. one of mr. satorius's points, which is the coordination and i think this is one of those places where we can play a special role and do along with nrc and dhs. reaching out to law enforcement can be ply cated. there are many layers. you might be in a tribal area. it might be a university campus with its own security police. it could be an environment you have local, county and state

police. part of what we do, collaboratively, to go a bit above and beyond what is in the rule is to organize a table tops exercises that involve all elements of the community. these exercises really help bring together the different elements of the community that would be involved in response to any kind of incident and so far in collaboration with our colleagues at the department of energy who do counter terrorism and counter proliferation we've run well over 100 of these exercises all over the united states in community -- >> how often? like in a year or what? >> several a year usually. but we have found that the feedback from this kind of exercise is extremely positive. but, you know, if you -- if you were to try to regulate that

sort of exercise i'm not sure how you could do it. but this is one of the steps by looking together at how we can collaboratively improve the security posture, we've come up with some approaches like this that i think we feel are very positive contribution to the overall security. >> speaking for the domestic nuclear detection officer i can tell you that the collaboration one is very critical because the trusted networks by virtue of these exercises and all the work we do in our trilateral meetings, in our government coordination council, et cetera they help us build an ability to get the early indicator, the early warning, so that the law enforcement aspects with the detection capabilities can respond and help and find the lost or stolen sources.

so we certainly support the regulatory work at the nrc and the additional work that administrator harrington just mentioned because it enables our end of the mission spectrum, the detection, the find, fix and locate piece. >> how do the safeguards that have been described here this morning, how do they compare with safeguards in place with other countries around the world where it's radio graphy cameras or other devices? even medical radioactive material, how does our work compare with that of other countries? >> this really is a global challenge, and it's i think to the credit of the countries involved in the nuclear security summit process that they really have brought radiological security to the fore since the 2012 summit when it was added to the list of active targets for

collaboration. i mentioned in my testimony that at the 2014 summit, the united states and 22 other countries made a commitment that by the time of the 2016 summit, we would have taken steps to secure all category 1 sources. so that now is on our collective plates in the united states to deliver that to the 2016 summit, and we will work collaboratively with other countries. but i would venture to say that the photographs that we saw here today, could reasonably represent the similar challenges within the international community. in fact, i was at a conference in southern africa earlier this year and as you know, very rich in natural resources and the countries are extremely worried

about the dirty bomb threat because of the number of sources, the lack of regulation, lack of secure procedures, lack of a, you know, strong independent regulator to provide a framework and so we will work with those countries collaboratively to try to help them improve their profile. >> okay. >> when i was governor of delaware for eight years, we were very much involved in the national governors association, had a clearing house for good ideas and i remember many cabinet meetings presiding over with our cabinet when we're discussing a particular challenge in our state, saying to my cabinet, some other states has faced this challenge and they have figured it out and they are the gold standard. we had as i said in the national governors association, a clearing house for a good idea

and we had the ability to find out what other state had addressed this satisfactory, where the contact people were and how to get in touch with them. in many instances. do we have that capability with maybe looking, i don't know if we look state to state, but it's not from state to state to see who's best -- who has the best practices in this regard or maybe from country to country who has the best practices. maybe it's us. could you all speak to that, please? >> i can start. >> please. >> senator. i'll speak from an agreement state perspective. where we have 37 states within the united states that have signed an agreement, the governor has signed an agreement, with the chairman of the nrc that where we -- well, we first -- they want to take over the responsibilities for the safety and security of certain radioactive sources.

and we have a process that we review their program and ensure it has the right staffing. >> excuse me. why would a state want to take over that responsibility? >> many reasons. is that we charge fees for licenses and doing our regulatory activities. we're a 90% fee recoverable agency. and so be charge fees. they oftentimes can do it for less money so it's kind of a service to their cut tight wents where they're -- constituents where they're able to provide their users the use of these sources safely and compliant with our requirements at a less cost to their citizens. >> okay. others on the issue of compliance and best practices, whether it's within this country or outside of this country please? >> well, you mentioned senator

akaka before and i had the honor to testify before him several years ago, and he was truly a leader in this area and worked very hard with -- >> what do you suppose inspired him? >> i'm not sure. i would ask my team, especially yanna iliapolis for us, she worked very closely with the senator and with the state of hawaii to bring them in to full compliance with all regulations and as far as i know they were the first state to do that. >> okay. >> i think the senator -- >> can you step a little closer to the microphone, please. just take a moment and we'll -- let you escape to your seat. >> say your name, please. >> my name is yanna ilapolis and

i work for nsa program. >> maybe you can spell that for us later. >> it's like -- >> i don't think i could, joanna with an i. very simple. i think the senator was truly a visionary and care about a lot of post-september 11 threats and there were a lot of indicators in the early days post-september 11th and intellectually had talked to other congressmen and senators on this issue and requested that the gao look into the area and i think with the gao's audits, which were somewhat painful on federal programs, but i think in the end raised the visibility of some of the vulnerabilities we have both domestically and internationally and he was a clear advocate of if it can be done in my state, i

have medical facilities, i have usda eradiators, i have navy base, i have a lot of things in my backyard if it can be done in my state and increase the security posture that could serve as a model going forward with other states. so it was a push on our part. we didn't solely focus on hawaii. we focus on major metropolitan areas and other states across the country on a voluntary basis, but his foresight and his advocacy on this issue, clearly articulated the need for others to step up and step forward. >> all right. thank you. thank you very much. >> mr. trimble. >> i would just add that previously, gao has done some work in this area. we looked at the issue of orphaned sources and we looked at how they were handling this

issue in france and had innovative ideas. we haven't looked at the cross-organizational sharing aspect but we have done some work overseas to look at how other countries have tackled some of these issues. >> i guess it would be understandable that if other states, other nations rather, have these devices, that they have radioactive materials in them, whether they're mobile or stationary and if other countries do not secure them well, and those materials were obtained, they could be used for bad purposes in those countries or maybe anywhere. what do we have to reduce the likelihood if another country did not have -- did not secure these -- their radioactive materials as well, what

assurances do we have with the way we protect our own borders and ports of entry, that we'll be able to detect or intercept any of that material coming in? dr. gowadia? >> yes. thank you, senator, for that question. at dhs we believe in a multifaceted layered approach to our security, so this begins well overseas. in my office the domestic nuclear detection office we work very closely with the international atomic energy agency so that we can promulgate best practices across the globe of all 159 member states now have access to best practice guides on building national architectures, exercising training and awareness, and we are even beginning to teach some of the courses at the international law enforcement academy. that is our first outreach. we also work with partner nations certainly to encourage

them to have layered approaches within the nations. i guess as i go through my answer, you'll see me building layer after layer so we can make a nuclear terrorism a harder and harder undertaking for the adversary. we use information such as manifest data to focus our overseas scanning efforts and certainly collaborate with our intelligence community partners so we can get the early indicators, the early intelligence warnings and surge our assets as necessary. at the borders itself, we have very robust capabilities, almost 100% of our container cargo is scanned at our sea ports. 100% of vehicular traffic that comes across our land borders at our ports of entry get similarly scanned. we have well trained law enforcement officers and customs and border protection and united states coast guard.

every boarding party in the united states coast guard carries detection equipment. all incoming general aviation flights are met by customs and border officers who have the right equipment and scan the incoming aircraft. these are some of the examples i can think of. of course with your continued support we will continue to make the right investments and appropriately balance capabilities to build strength after strength at our borders and with our international partners. >> well, to be honest, all that is encouraging. and so we're grateful for the work that's being done. i like to say everything i do, i know i can do better. sometimes i say the road to improve is always under construction. and just give us some examples of what we're doing better today and maybe what we're doing in the not too distant past and maybe mention a couple areas where we can do better still. this would be for you and for others as well.

>> i guess i'll start. one of the things we do better today is inform our efforts based on a more wholistic look at the risk. my office is responsible for coordinating the global nuclear detection architecture and implementing its domestic component. so in these fiscally constrained days, we have to balance our resources to get the maximum bang for buck. so we are now analyzing risk informed schemes, building better feeds from information so that our mobile architecture can be better responsive to -- more responsive to a credible threat. so that's something we're doing better. i could not agree with you more, so no matter what we're doing we can always do something better, a lot better. and with the adversary being adaptive we have to continue to grow and stay ahead of their capabilities as well. you heard the administrator talk

about exercising, illicit nuclear materials are not something a law enforcement officer sees on a day-to-day basis. so we must practice. we must keep our skills up to speed and we do that with some of our exercise field exercises where we use uncommon sources to expose our officers to things they don't see on a normal basis. these are some of the activities. integrated exercising i think is something we can do better moving forward. and our communications coordination function, always can be better. >> anyone else? miss harrington? >> so dr. gowadia mentioned the global nuclear detection architecture. there was a white house review of gnda last year and within the context of that review, some

very specific areas for the programs that we run at the department of energy were identified as necessary to fill certain gaps. for example, our second line of defense program works very carefully and closely with dhs. we install radiological detection devices in ports where there is a lot of outgoing cargo traffic to the united states. so we try to catch things before they even are headed to the united states and we're particularly interested in nuclear material, but radiological sources are also a very big concern and a large number do get caught through this system, identified, isolated and then handled appropriately. also internationally, since 2004, and we just actually

celebrated the ten-year anniversary of our global threat reduction initiative we've done an enormous amount of work internationally to both secure sources, identify disposition pathways, work with countries to develop best practices, work on an international code of conduct for the security of radiological sources, so this is an extremely active area of programming for us and one where we will continue to be extremely active. i think one of our biggest accomplishments was first identifying and then retiring the radiological thermo electric generators, the rtgs, used by russia to power lighthouses in very remote locations and so forth. these were massive sources and

one of them could have been used for many, many dirty bombs. so that was a huge accomplishment over multiple years. but we've had similar kinds of work going on across the globe for the last decade. >> senator, i would just add that one of the things we're doing better today that we weren't doing in the past has to do with our source security rule making i mentioned earlier. there's six focus areas within that rule making that makes us this a more effective rule and that includes as i think i had mentioned background checks, including fbi fingerprinting to help ensure that individuals are allowed and source cans do so unescorted, controlling personnel access or risk significant sources are being stored, documenting security programs. a written security program that lays out how the licensees will

safeguard these sources, coordinating with local law enforcement to have a plan in place in case there's theft or diversion, and coordinating and tracking radioactive source shipments such if they become lost during shipment there's a planner to be able to find themp. >> okay. good. >> i would add just one -- >> mr. trimble. >> i think the international efforts we've discussed today in terms of protecting the country, highlight in an incorrect way the importance of the issues we bring up in our report because as those pathways become more and more difficult for anyone to navigate, the easiest path is domestic. why try to bring something in from overseas if you can just go to the local hospital or go to the warehouse to get the source. so this underscores the importance of the making sure the nrc requirements for

domestic medical and industrial users are robust and the weaknesses we identified i think are, you know, the points i would highlight in terms where we can do better. looking at the definition of co-locations so that all vulnerable facilities are subject to the regulations, improving how we do background checks, giving better guidance on who should and should not be given such access, examining whether nrc should be playing a bigger role in that process, providing more specific guidance to companies and licensees who are not security professionals. these are commercial companies doing a business. they may have some health and science background but not security professionals. they immediate more help than what we're giving them right now. >> good. let's go back to the radio graphy cameras before -- one of the questions i asked, are they category 1 or category 2? >> they're category 2. and they have a source that

needs to be replenished fairly often because if of its half life. >> what would be fairly often? every year or two? >> about every three months. >> that is fairly often. all right. are we aware of any effort to actually mount an attack using a dirty bomb in this country or another country? are we aware someone has attempted much like in boston where we had the effort to unfortunately successful to use pressure cookers to hurt, kill and maim a lot of people, we've seen the use of substance in the air to poison and kill people in subways, so we have actual demonstrate the uses of technology to hurt people. do we have any documentation about attacks either in this country or other countries where this was actually tried, maybe

failed? maybe aborted? >> i do not, sir. there is the general threat that we make every effort to safeguard against. i'm not sure if my colleagues are aware of any attempts to produce a dirty bomb using our sources. >> if you want to follow up with a classified briefing on the topic, we could go into that in more detail. >> good enough. i'm going to ask a follow on question, if it's one not appropriate to answer in this space, just say so. but people can go on the internet and learn all kinds of things, including how to build weapons. and nuclear weapons, pressure

cooker bombs and i presume dirty bombs. given the access to that kind of information, why do you suppose no one has done it at least to our knowledge and certainly not been successful in doing it. maybe it's because our security measures we're talking about in this country are pretty good, getting better, maybe it's because that's true in other countries. maybe the -- it's not as easy as it sounds to do and the -- maybe people decided it's too dangerous they're going to hurt or maim other people, they maybe find some way to do it that's less damaging to the perpetrator although a lot of them don't seem to care about whether they live or die. why do you suppose we've not seen it attempted more? mr. trimble? >> i'll just jump in to start

the conversation. i mean i think the efforts of nsa, dhc, nrc deserve credit for all they've done to try to secure these sources. i think where the conversation is going is our -- is there more that we can do, though, and that's where our report is coming from and really it's just premised on the idea that it only takes one to make a really bad day. >> others, please. >> just quickly, i would like to say that i believe it's some of the efforts that we've taken in putting together regulatory programs as well as other programs that is certainly one of the drivers. we've made it very hard for people to get their hands on these things. >> doctor? >> i would echo a lot of what you've said and we've heard today, but in a different setting i think we can go into

more specifics. >> okay. miss harrington. >> i support dr. gowadia's statement about taking this up in a different environment. >> fair enough. captain, let me come back to you and ask does the nrc have mechanisms to review unescorted access decisions made by licensees? for instance, if a licensee grants unescorted access to an individual with a violent criminal history will the nrc be immediately made aware of this action and able to take immediate action? >> we would be able to inspect it at our next scheduled inspection activity. that's when we review the decision making by the licensee staff on trust worthiness and reliability. >> mr. trimble, do you want to react to that. >> my understanding of the guidelines what's being reviewed is that various factors were considered but the actual

decision is left to the licensees. there's still no prescription if someone has convictions for certain things they are not allowed to have access. >> does that sound satisfactory? should we be concerned about that ladies? >> so i would respectfully defer to my regulatory colleagues and director satorius' position. it is -- and support and advocate for his mission because again, the more secure these sources are, the easier it becomes for the detection end of things. >> okay. do you think it would be helpful, again mr. satorius, be helpful to require that licensee get a second opinion from their respective state or the nrc regarding the trust worthiness of an individual? >> senator, i don't think it would. and the reason is, as a regulatory body, we expect our licensees to perform these

activities. we give them good guidance so that they can follow and they can -- they'll repeat the right decisions. but i would say that it's not within our per view to be consultants. we review what the licensee has done and make a decision on whether they comply with our regulations. >> in any of your regulations does the nrc expressly prohibit licensees from granting unescorted access to individuals convicted of making terroristic threats? >> they do not. >> okay. maybe one more question and then we'll wrap up. we're going to tart voting in just -- start voting in just a few minutes. this would be one for miss harrington and captain satorius. this is on security enhancement. i understand that the national nuclear initiative works with

the nuclear regulatory commission, licenses state local and tribal governments and other federal agencies to build on the existing regulatory requirements by providing voluntary security enhancements and let me ask of you, administrator harrington, how many security enhancements has the national security administration put into place on industrial and construction facilities and a follow up would be what obstacles stand in your way from installing some form of security upgrades for high risk radiological sources? >> i don't know if these numbers break out strictly the industrial facilities, but according to our analysis, there are approximately 3,000 buildings in the united states containing high risk radiological sources. of that number, we have already worked in 650 buildings

providing our security upgrade program and we intend to complete another 45 in this fiscal year. so that is i think a reasonable accomplishment but that only gets us up to, you know, 700 out of 3,000. we've also recovered -- >> what about the other 2300? >> well, those are in out year plans, but with the budget environment as it is, we have had to extend the target date for completion farther than we had originally thought would be possible. the other part of this is the disposition pathway for these sources, and that is often a challenge because you either have to find a secure storage

facility for long-term storage, or you know, some other way to safely dispose of those sources. it is the -- it is the licensee's responsibility to do that unless the source that they have has no clear disposition pathway in which case we can step in and assist. >> okay. >> mr. satorius, if you have something to add feel free to do so briefly otherwise i'm going to bring us to a close for now. anything else you want to add there? on this point? >> not on this point. i think my colleague has said it very carefully. >> okay. these are enhancements and we believe that compliance with our regulations provide adequate protection for the public. senator, i do need to correct one statement i made earlier for the record if i could do that very quickly. >> sure. >> that is not all category 1 sources are inspected on a yearly basis.

the inspection is based on the safety and robustness sf the device and some cat some of them take it seriously,ers do not. it's hard for one committee such as this one to really exercise merry tortious insight over the entire federal government.

we are like 15 or 16 people and as good as we are and our staffs it's a little bit too much for us to handle. but one of the things we do, can do from time to time is partner with the gio and ask from time to time look at issues or threats and ask questions how are we doing. what are we doing well, maybe what are others in other countries doing even better we can learn from or even particular states. hope and pray that the subject of today's hearing is something that will just always be the subject for a hearing or for speculation and nobody's ever going to be hurt or inconvenienced in any way because of an attack of had this nature. you never know. and what we can do is try to make sure that we're doing everything we can to hope for the best, prepare for the worst.

and i'm encouraged today to hear that there's a fair amount of work going on to protect our people and to share that information with our nations so they can better protect their own folks. but i certainly don't want to hear or someone ask the question, why didn't somebody do something about this threat of a dirty bomb. why didn't somebody do something to protect against it. and i want us to be able to say, well, we worked hard in order to protect our people. and our country from a threat of this nature. so as i said earlier, everything i do i know i can do better. i think that's true of all of us and true of every federal program and so our goal is perfection. probably hard to reach. that's a good goal for us. so conclude by saying how much we appreciate not just your being here, not just preparing

for the hearing, not just answering my questions, but also we appreciate the work you do for our country. thank you for your service to our nation. the hearing record will remain open for 15 days. that's until june 27th at 5:00 p.m. for the submission of statements an questions for the record. and again, our thanks to each of you and with that this -- and to our majority/minority staff for helping us prepare for this hearing. with that this hearing is adjourned. this week c-span's covering a number of hearings on capitol hill. tomorrow the confirmation for san antonio mayor julian castro to be the secretary of housing and urban development for the

housing and urban affairs committee live tomorrow morning here on c-span 3 at 10:00 eastern. wednesday general motors's ceo mary barra testifies before a house committee about gm's internal investigation into the company's faulty ignition switch. "the wall street journal" reporting the committee holding that hearing released a memo today outlining some of what they hope to learn. lawmakers want to know if the investigation is the end of the gm's -- of gm's internal investigation and whether or not ms. barra believes the problems within gm contributed to other recall delays. she declined to answer many of the questions posed during hearings in april saying she wanted to wait for the internal investigate's report. that report was released june 5th. it cleared ms. barra and her executive team any of wrongdoing but criticized the bureaucracy in which senior legal managers shirked responsibility and lower level engineers either concealed or overlooked final information. you can watch the gm hearing wednesday, live at 10:00 a.m. eastern right here an c-span3.

last week, homeland security secretary jeh johnson testified before the senate judiciary committee on immigration reform, border deportation policies and other issues. the chair of the committee is senator patrick leahy of vermont. this is secretary johnson's first appearance before the committee since he was confirmed. >> i welcome jeh johnson today to the judiciary committee for his first oversight hearing as secretary of the department of homeland security. note for the record we're starting late because we had a roll call vote on the floor. and both senator grassley and i want to accommodate members to vote and then come here.

for the past several months, secretary johnson has led an agency that plays a vital role in protecting our national security, providing disaster relief and ensuring cybersecurity. the department of homeland security also has primarily responsibility for implementing a -- enforcing our immigration laws. something that the secretary has acknowledged ed id is broken. one year ago this committee came together after weeks of exhaustive deliberations. we met all day, way into the evening. day after day we passed bipartisan legislation to fix the broken immigration system. we then had major debate on it out on the floor of the senate, and we passed it in the senate with a bipartisan majority. it would unite families. certainly spur the economy as everybody from grover norquist on said it would give a huge

boost to our economy. and help protect our borders. we knew last year the cost of inaction was too great. and members of this committee, the full senate, passed historic legislation that would create a system worthy of american values. unfortunately, the house leadership refused to act. last year senators reached across the aisle. we worked together on meaningful and comprehensive legislation. but always seen from the house republican leadership so far shifting principles and repeated postponements. and i think that's a mistake. the republicans and democrats came together here in the senate. they ought to be able to do the same thing in the house. i don't think it's helped the republican party, but it also has not helped the country. and that should be more important than any party. every day the house fails to act is another day that families are torn apart and our economy lags. every day the house fails to

act, we realize human cost of doing nothing to fix our broken immigration system. we see the human cost in the gripping photographs of young children seeking a better life, housed in facilities at the border. even this morning's news shows pictures of that. the pictures are shocking. so are the numbers. 2011, 6,560 unaccompanied children crossed the border. some younger even than my youngest grandchildren. and those numbers are now skyrocketing. just in the last seven months nearly 50,000 children have already been apprehended. that number will likely double before the end of 2014. that's more children than all the people in the largest city in my state of vermont. president obama's called this an urgent humanitarian situation. i agree. and i commend secretary johnson for coordinate with relevant agencies to address this dire situation. our reports indicate the flow is

overwhelming the agency's responsibility for these children. the senate passed immigration bill would help address this issue. people want to address it. the house should take that billup immediately. and i'm deeply concerned that the conditions and treatment of other immigrant detainees, especially those who are sexually assaulted while in custody. when congress passed the violence against women reauthorization act last year, included a provision designed to prevent sexual violence at dhs facilities. and i thank the department for recently issuing compliance regulations. i look forward to hearing about the changes under way to stop the abuse. i'm troubled by reports of border agents using deadly force. since 2010, agents were assaulted with rocks, they've responded in deadly force resulting in ten deaths. one who received in effect this

death sentence is jose rodriguez, a 16-year-old boy shot multiple times, including in the back of his head. he shouldn't have thrown a rock, but he shouldn't have been shot. 20 months later, the investigation in this boy's death is still without resolution. the border patrol's recent release of his use of force policy hanbook and directive to our personnel should respond to threats with a positive step. we need more transparency. we need more timely resolution. so the families involved can have closure. agents can have better training. in addition to this human cost for our broken immigration system is a powerful economic cost. i have long championed eb-5 regional program because of this job creation potential in vermont and other states. senator sessions is joining me on that. it's done with no cost to american taxpayers.

but absent congressional action to make this jobs program permanent, the program's potential is limited. i am concerned that visa processing, delays are threatening to undermine economic development where it's needed most. this uncertainty can slow down the program's growth and deter investors. so i urge the department to focus on timely consideration eb-5 applications. the status quo is not an option. it's not sustainable for our families. for our economy. for our national security. the humanitarian crisis we now face is just the latest reminder of why house republicans must react as we did in the senate a year ago. republicans and democrats came together to fix our broken immigration system. we waited too long. still a window of time. the republican leadership of the house to join us in this important event effort. so i look forward to discussing these issues with secretary

johnson. i'll yield first to senator grassley and then we'll hear from the secretary. >> secretary johnson, i appreciate your being here. hearings like this are very essential to congress' oversight of the executive branch. you have committed, secretary johnson, to cooperating with congress. i appreciate that. i know that you have instructed your staff to respond to every letter in a timely manner. there are some letters that are older than before you become secretary that the department still hasn't responded to. of course, the fact that those weren't responded to isn't your fault but maybe you can do what you can to speed up what other secretaries haven't done. so many times answers are not responses so it's especially nice to have you here today to provide answers on issues that we all care about. two weeks ago, the house judiciary committee asked you, mr. secretary, to explain why the department released more than 36,000 convicted criminal

aliens from custody in the year 2013. at that time, you didn't have an answer, saying that you wanted to, quote, a deeper understanding of this issue. so i look forward to hearing today what you have learned on those issues in the last two weeks because releasing 36,000 people with criminal convictions is no small matter. these individuals have been convicted of homicide, sexual assault, kidnapping. there are also many of them drunk drivers and drug offenders and, of course, now they are free roaming our streets. the administration cannot hide behind the excuse that it released these individuals due to court order, although that might be true in some cases. but in many cases, the deciding -- decision to release was entirely voluntary. the department needs to explain those decisions in specific cases and detail. i'm also concerned that the

president believes he can and should act on his own when he doesn't get his way with congress. he said -- you've heard this quote -- i've got a pen and i've got a phone. for example, 2012, congress was not consulted about deferring enforcement action on individuals in the country illegally. the department made its own rules and the program has proven to be a haven for loopholes and mischief. the secretary just announced a renewal of the program and weakened it. for example, the administration gutted the requirement and made the process easier to reapply by eliminating any need to provide evidence. what's alarming is that the department confirmed that it does not routinely check the validity of documents that are presented by applicants. when applications seem to be rubber stamped and lawful status is so easily obtained, it's no wonder there's been a