many of the findings of gao the are still unresolved. this continues to harm the ability of va to bring justice and report to employees to -- happy 2020 hearing, i voiced my concern that the va's timeline to implement gao's party recommendations are taking way too long. now, two years later, we're sitting here once again, and today, i hope we will not be hearing the same promises and excuses. as we know, va deputy secretary romney declined to be here today. as a leader within the department, i would expect the deputy secretary to lead from the front, take responsibility, and voiced his commitment to immediately resolve this issue for va employees. as far as i see, there is no sense of urgency and that is a problem. the 2020 gao report stated absent additional action, some va employees may continue to distrust va's handling of sexual harassment allegations. there are additional reports that date back decades on this very subject, which exposed many of the same problems and distrust. for one, the equal employment opportunity commission fou

the 2020 gao report stated, absent additional action, some v.a. employees may continue to distrust v.a. handling of sexual harassment allegations. additional reports take back decades on this subject which exposed many of the same problems, and distrust. the equal employment opportunity commission found that both the departmentwide eeo director in the eeo program managers at the v.a. are misaligned, creating the perception there is a conflict of interest among v.a. workforce. further, v.a. policies are not consistent throughout the agency and are missing crucial information such as including all options employees have for reporting sexual harassment, not to mention data collected from sexual harassment complaint and reports are incomplete. v.a. must create a culture where employees are not stifled against reporting workplace harassment. sexual-harassment is underreported. department leaders must work with the equal employment opportunity commission to implement compliance policies and procedures in order to ensure a safe, healthy and supportive wo

fps is on the gao's high-risk list for nearly 20 years, gao has found fps is not assessing risks in a manner consistent with standards that is the national infrastructure protectionplan risk management flame framework . it is especially worrisome because of a failure by fps could have catastrophic results and the focus of today's hearing is on the process. fps provides recommendations to every federal facility to protect the interagency community standards. this standard is housed within infrastructure w security division collaboratively establishing monitors and enhances the security protections of the federal facilities. as we hear from our witnesses today a large majority of the recommendations : health of those assessments have not yet been implemented . which begs the obvious question why not? here i would like to hear their perspectives from witnesses on the following questions . number one, is fps positioned correctly to be the most effective? number two how does fps work with cisa and how that borative is relationship. why do such a majority of recommendations go on implemente

prior to gao, dr. sherman worked at the new america foundation, a nonpartisan think tank that focuses on a range of public policy issues including national security studies. dr. sherman, welcome to our committee. you may proceed with your opening remarks. >> chairman peters, ranking member portman, distinguished members of the committee. i am pleased to be here today to discuss the reauthorization of the department of homeland security's countering weapons of mass destruction office alongside acting assistant secretary rasicot and chief medical officer gandhi. cwmd's mission to support its domestic and international partners in safeguarding our nation against chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear threats is a most critical one. as we have all witnessed, responding to even a single one of these threats can be a significant challenge. an effective and coordinated effort is needed to combat the threat landscape that has become increasingly complex, highly dynamic and potentially more catastrophic

she has worked for gao for nearly 20 years where she oversees gao's work on federal property management including facility security and personal assets. with the chechen the witnesses full statements will be inserted into the record and i now ask each witness to summarize his or her statement in five minutes. beginning with deputy director cline. welcome sir. >> aborning chairman correa ranking member meijer i'm honored to be here today represent the federal protection service or at ts. to testify that the essential role we play in protecting employees to thank you for the opportunity raise awareness about the physicality of our mission. fps employs nearly thousand dedicated law enforcement officers to protect the people and property of the federal government and her services provide retractions in to deter threats at thousands of facilities across the united states and territories and protects millions of employees. our highest party is the safety and security of them will wear the 1.4 million employees working in the facilities that we protect. we cannot achieve this mission without t

i know that that gao report looked at 2018, 19, 20. but as i stated in my opening comments, in the last two years, a lot of the things that -- i have about 21 initiatives i could explain today. these things didn't exist. i read that study, i'm embarrassed to see that because i have a lot of pride in va. we are committed, absolutely, to turn existing around and fixing it. and i think we are. >> okay, well, i hope what you're saying is true. i just feel as though, i was very involved in the debris sampson bill, i feel there's a huge sense of urgency here. it is taking a long time to get to a place where we can actually say we have a zero tolerance sexual harassment policy. and that the va is really focused on this issue, and bill they get environment for their employees that is safe and trusting. i think the numbers tell us something. the data tells us something. those numbers are important, to be able to tell ourselves how well we're doing. but also, it tells us we could learn from this data, to find out what kinds of things we need to

gao is the government wide and they have a role to play in this. give advice on how to do things more efficiently and how to identify fraud of prevent that from happening. host: we will see congress back in session before they go on break for campaigning. do you get a sense that puerto rico will be on the agenda? guest: we have heard requests from representatives already. they asked the federal government take on 100% of the rebuilding cost. right now, it is at about 75%. they want the federal government to for all of it. we are coming up on the deadline and the biden administration has requested 6 billion dollars for emergency relief that is attached to the spending bill to keep those agencies funded. there is some wishy-washy about whether that will be included. republicans of said we don't need that or we can use leftover covid funds for that. maybe now with the way these hurricanes have made landfall, there could be a little more of an appetite to provide those funds. host: one more call from ed, in new york. caller: good morning, quick questio

el ex-nadador dela universidad de florida, que gaÓ cinco veces los honores compleÓ la carrera en 3 horasta hora gracias por acompa

does the gao have recommendations to help resolve the inner agency disputes such as using in some form independent third party analysis? >> thank you for the question, senator hickenlooper. we don't have recommendations specific to using a third party, but certainly, when we make recommendations to the agencies around trying to come together to have, you know, common understanding of what sort of technical studies should happen. we leave it to them to sort of determine exactly the best way to do that. so they decide that a third party would be a useful tool in certain circumstances, in terms of an arbiter, i think we would be supportive of that. you know, and the new mou between them they talked about a renewed focus on sharing technical information. they each would sit on advisory committees of the other and i think that goes a long way to get what you're talking about. >> great. thank you very much, i appreciate it and you guys have discussed this so many facets of interagency collaboration, a that's a point we'll talk for this. i'll yield back to the chair. >> thank you, senator you

the gao found a few allocating agencies had requirements to guard against the misrepresentation of costs and the gao also found weaknesses in the data quality and inconsistencies in the practice not including the full extent of costs. the gao also found particularly related to the lenders uc berkeley is innovation estimates each additional lender as an additional $6,400 in cost per units. lawsuits also delay affordable development. in california against affordable housing they are often found in the offices of california environmental quality act which is recognized within the states to block and delay the development rather than being used for the express purpose of protecting the environment. i recommend congress visit the recommendations including those that are collected and analyzed by a single federal entity. american home affordability can be increased by the adoption of low-cost techniques improving efficiencies in helping state and local agencies to create acceptable opportunities in areas of high demand. thank you so much. >> thank you. mr. roberts. >> thank you for your leader

and i think what the gao is telling me is that our stakeholders are responding to that. >> thank you. on june 23rd of this year, senator portman and i introduced s4465, the officers of countering weapons of mass destruction and health security act. the bill reauthorize the cwmd office and authorizes the newly created office of health security at the department of homeland security. clarifying roles and responsibilities for both offices and adding accountability and oversight measures. my question is, for you, mister gary rasicot and doctor pritesh gandhi, we will start with you, doctor pritesh gandhi. can you briefly discussed how this will help you achieve your mission to protect the homeland against weapons of mass destruction and health threats. >> thank you. for the last 18 months, our team has served as a nerve center for everything public health and medical that the department has to face. ranging from -- the implications of what we are seeing at the southwest border. thinking critically about how we ensure workforce health and safety in the midst of a pandemic. seemingly have a

your office has received recommendations from both the inspector general and the gao on both ppp and covid eidl, many of which are pretty common sense, including continually assessing the covid eidl program and developing portfolio level data analytics help identify fraudulent loans and fraud risk factors. yet these recommendations and others have remained open for more than a year while watchdogs have identified billions in fraud, and law enforcement prosecutes fraud case after fraud case. i've heard from a lot of iowans who said that ppp and covid eidl loans were helpful for them in the early days of the pandemic, but when we listen to inspector general where, he's right when he says that ppp and covid eidl have unprecedented levels of fraud. so it has been helpful but there's a lot of fraud ongoing in these programs. we've all seen this story about the bmw with a license plate ppp loan. this is manhattan in new york, and we have seen so many of these cases. i don't think the program was her for folks to buy brand-new vehicles. but as a programs would driving down and they're stick

over the past year, the gao has released a number of reports on the federal spectrum.ll to improve their collaboration on spectrum planning. can you talk on that? i am not sure if you saw the page that was signed monday by mr. davidson and the chair. can you comment on that as well if you have seen it? and any other coronation issues beyond just spectrum policy, i think there is a whole host of areas where federal agencies, particularly those two agencies need better coordination for efficiency in our spectrum. we will host a summit next week with the sec, and tia all up in alaska, other federal agencies on this issue of ordination and the deployment of federal funds. >> absolutely so. we were really looking for the agencies to shore up their collaboration processes. i think it is a great first step. they read our report, they gave a lot of comments on. one of the reclamation's we did make that is not really reflected is related to and tia and how it coordinate with other federal agencies. one of the things we thought was important was they document so they can underst

. >> how many people did you have the gao take a look at this? >> two. >> what length of time? >> may to september. may of 22 to september of 2022. >> 's of about five months. i had to do my fingers. so two people and with two people working for a few months, you determined that we were missing close to a thousand death reports because you had to dfind open source reporting basically. >> a lot of it was open source data reporting and publicly available data and some of the databases that do collect this information, theca non-doj. >> did you know approximately how many deaths occurred in custody within the state and local jails every year? >> unfortunately,ow we do not. >> just ballpark. not precise butut talking about ballpark. is it a couple thousand? >> since 2019 there were in the local jails 1200 deaths. >> what about estate? >> state and federal was about 4200. >> why do you combine state and federal and not a state and local? >> it's not a trick question. it's just a question. it's curiosity. we normally separate federal and now you've got state and local. why? >> local

and those challengers not policyholders face can you explain the key challenges that gao identified withce to ensure policies? >> thank you senator for your question on that topic we have closely reviewed the store on —- the city and contributed we agree with the conclusions in that study looking at the pricing challenges and increases then the carriers are withdrawing coverage area and that is the extent to which cybercoverage is enavailable to small and medium enterprises and in particular for the first time last year regarding the extent to which they can access that coverage and that will be a priority of our work going forward and in additionally the aspect of the work we are doing regarding the catastrophic bextra on —- backstop. >> for clarificationon terrorism insurance i know the function and the degree of the attack and those that were written and the work in our area we can discuss extensively look at how the certification provisions would apply to cyberevents looking at attributions. ou>> and then working with the insurance industry of cyberinsurance and then every day there

fy 21 alone according to the gao analysis produced the departmet failed to identify 1,000 deaths. in my assessment the number is likely much higher. of those recorded, 70% of the records were incomplete and 40% of records failed to capture the circumstances. the department of justice failed to complete the accurate data for the past two years and failed to report to congress how the data can be used to save lives. the investigation also found of the department has no plans to make state and local data public again despite the obvious public-interest in this transparency for the pursing of legislative text and the discussions are relevant. they arere relevant if the department has concluded in 2022, eight years after it was reauthorized that it is in capable of successfully implementing it, i am surely willing to work with thems to help fix that but this is about something more fundamental. focused on the federal prison system we revealed the detainees have been denied proper nutrition, hygiene and medical care, endured months of lockdown with no access to the outdoors were basic s

second part what is for the district attorney because i know i did that a couple weeks ago at gao. i think i'm just constantly amazed at people disrespecting this body when we, when i say people, i mean those like kaiser or people that wouldn't want to answer tough questions and answer to their calls for responsibilities. when this board trying to make the process very transparent for a public hearing. i know that we have the power of subpoena. i think she knows where i'm heading because i asked to subpoena the navy last time and now of course i'm asking, thanks to supervisor peskin that we can do that at gao committee and here we are as a whole as a body. in the event that kaiser is in violation of s. b. 221, because they are not providing the service within two weeks of time with the mandate of the service, and especially in the case that we do find any violation, what can we do to really make sure that kaiser do show up in the event that we decide to continue this hearing so that we can have another opportunity. will there be a possibility for kaiser to show up if there is a nee

second part what is for the district attorney because i know i did that a couple weeks ago at gao. i think i'm just constantly amazed at people disrespecting this body when we, when i say people, i mean those like kaiser or people that wouldn't want to answer tough questions and answer to their calls for responsibilities. when this board trying to make the process very transparent for a public hearing. i know that we have the power of subpoena. i think she knows where i'm heading because i asked to subpoena the navy last time and now of course i'm asking, thanks to supervisor peskin that we can do that at gao committee and here we are as a whole as a body. in the event that kaiser is in violation of s. b. 221, because they are not providing the service within two weeks of time with the mandate of the service, and especially in the case that we do find any violation, what can we do to really make sure that kaiser do show up in the event that we decide to continue this hearing so that we can have another opportunity. will there be a possibility for kaiser to show up if there is a nee

in fiscal year 21 alone according to gao analysis the department failed to identify 1000 deaths. my assessment is the true number is likely much higher. of those reported, 70% of the records were incomplete, 40% of records failed to capture the circumstances of death. the department of justice has failed to collect complete or accurate state and local death data for the past two years and failed to report to congress how deaths in custody can be used to save lives, a report required by law that is 6 years past due and we recently learned it is not affected to be produced for another two years. psi investigation also found the department has no plans to make state or local death data public again despite the obvious public interest in this transparency. today's hearing may dive into arcane discussions of administrative regulations or close parsing of legislative texts and those discussions are relevant. they are relevant. of the department has concluded in 2022, twee 8 years after this law was reauthorized that it is incapable of successfully implementing it i am surely willing to

you know, smiling all the time, talking with small talk really fast as well because she speak gao language, creole and english. so she's big 4 languages. about $300.00 people live in the tiny town of matter rancor but $200000.00 tourist pastor each year and it's a popular stock for truck drivers. had in the longest a senior sergeant homeless, jo, cuz when jo ann went missing the matter and it's a town this might offer basically the mind straight. and then out of town, it is a tear and camp way around. a lot of the original people lives in 2014, i was officer in charge of smattering and play stations and all this one of the 1st people involved in joining anderson christ. hello and is celebrated phyllis lee. remember i can. 4 on that north joe im news, we saw a number for quite family members and they were in the town earlier in the day and i left town. i went to an area south of town and come home with her immediate family. her mother step father and husband, we all socialize all the family together from the community and met her anchor. will go, drink, and then we took that day. everyone w

we heard from the vice president of the sense of china and globalization, victor gao, who stays the demand from countries to join the shanghai cooperation organization testifies to the alliance, his vitality anthem, bishop's future as steel has a special recipe because it does not embrace war and confrontation or use of false it embrace is peace, negotiation consensus, focusing on development and protecting stability and peaceful evolution of the situation rather then for example, thinking about imposing one's view onto and the other countries rather than act like a nice like maple which is more aggressive always thinking about wal therefore is becoming more and more important. and the fact that there are more countries which become new member, this is an indication that this organization has really ambition to achieve. and i believe it will become an important factor going forward. not only for member states, for all countries around s t o, and eventually will be a major factor on the global c. and while western powers have been stonewalling efforts to end the ukraine conflict, many other

over the past year, the gao has released a number of reports on the federal spectrum. all to improve their collaboration on spectrum planning. can you talk on that? i am not sure if you saw the page that was signed monday by mr. davidson and the chair. can you comment on that as well if you have seen it? and any other coronation issues beyond just spectrum policy, i think there is a whole host of areas where federal agencies, particularly those two agencies need better coordination for efficiency in our spectrum. we will host a summit next week with the sec, and tia all up in alaska, other federal agencies on this issue of ordination and the deployment of federal funds. >> absolutely so. we were really looking for the agencies to shore up their collaboration processes. i think it is a great first step. they read our report, they gave a lot of comments on. one of the reclamation's we did make that is not really reflected is related to and tia and how it coordinate with other federal agencies. one of the things we thought was important was they document so they can under

i do look forward to providing the response by the next gao haoeting on september 29.i want to say that i say thank you for the civil grand jury for their time and commitment to this work. [applause] as well as the community for not attending here today but continuing to push and hold us all accountable for damage caused to community by the navy's work in the shipyard. we have a lot of work to do to right these wrongs and most certainly to do that here at the board of supervisors. so i want to thank you, chair preston and vice chair chan for hearing this committee this afternoon at gao and would i like to move that we continue both items to september 29th, gao meeting. >> thank you, president walton. madam clerk call the roll. >> clerk: on the motion to continue items 3 and 4, vice chair chan. >> aye. >> clerk: chan aye. member walton. >> aye. >> clerk: chair preston. >> aye. >> clerk: preston aye, you have three ayes. >> motion passes and thank you everyone to your participation in this hearing. no we have been going long but we are not done yet. we are going to take

needs a bit more time to do so and asked we continue this to our next regular meeting of gao which is october 6, so i like to move to continue items 1 and 2 to october 6. >> thank you chair. apologies there is a member of the public requested to speak to this item. >> did we close public comment previously? i don't recall. why don't we go ahead and reopen public comment to accommodate the caller. >> please pass the last caller through. >> hello. just wanted to state that the expert in the taxi medallion (inaudible) >> pardon me. we have closed public comment for that item and moved to item 1 and 2. >> sorry. >> if you like to send comments you can send viae-mail as well. >> thank you madam clerk. apologies for that caller. public comment on the item is closed as indicated you can e-mail comments to us. i think officially i had reopened public comment on item 1 and 2 so i will go ahead now and if we don't have additional callers on 1 and 2? >> that is correct, chair, no additional callers. >> thank you. public comment on 1 and 2 is closed, and can you call the roll on the motion to con

i would like to know what steps has taken to implement the gao recommendations? what more could be done to improve the bop's pandemic response? >> thank you, senator. this has certainly been an area that i have been interested in. especially as we are looking at potentially be exposed to monkeypox. making sure we let learned lessons from covid as a video of potentially a new pandemic. the bureau has administered over 329,000 doses of covid vaccine to more than 162,000 individuals. the bureau offers the vaccine 12 new incarcerated individuals. those who previously refused to vaccine. no there are communication measures outwl there and educatn out there to ensure they understand prevention protocols and access to this vaccine. i am pleased to report as of earlier this month almost 66% of those in our custody are fully vaccinated. an 80% of our employees have been fully vaccinated. so, i know the pandemic is still at hand. we are taking these measures very seriously. including maintaining the cdc criteria implementation at the bureau. >> thank you, senator feinstein

gao we'll expand on these issues as we continue our ongoing review. mister chairman, this concludes my prepared statement, and i look forward to answering any questions the committee may have. >> thanks very much, mister mctigue. miss huie, thank you. >> good morning. >> sorry, i misread, our second witness will be mr. hennessey, followed by miss huie. >> my home state senator and members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to speak with you about this matter of great importance to small businesses. lydon coined company's mission is to bring the joy of coin collecting to his many americans as possible. we serve collectors in all 50 states by mail order directly to their homes from their single physical location in new hampshire. prior to the way for ruling we have never been subject collecting state local taxes. the ruling mediately required us to be a tax collector for up to 12 state and local jurisdictions, with no way to calculate tax, leaving us liable to pay the bill ourselves. we rushed to become compliant, incurring costs of $222, 0