Congressional Hearings – Week of 3-5-12

The Senate is joining the budget hearing schedule in force this week, but the big news is the CFATS hearing before a subcommittee of the House Homeland Security Committee.

CFATS Problems

The Cybersecurity, Infrastructure Protection and Security Technologies Subcommittee of the House Homeland Security Committee will be holding a hearing tomorrow on the CFATS program problems. It looks like Chairman Lungren is serious about this hearing as there will be two panels testifying. The first panel will be the management team including Under Secretary Beers, Director Anderson, and Deputy Director Wulf. The second panel will be a tad bit more interesting; Bill Almond from SOCMA, Timothy Scott from Dow Chemical, and David Wright from the American Federation of Government Employees Local 918.

I would have preferred to hear some of the lower level management and some of the inspection force testify, but a union rep will probably have to do at this point.

It will be interesting to see what questions are asked. Hopefully the congress critters will be a tad bit more prepared and knowledgeable in this hearing, not like the fiasco in the February hearing before the Energy and Economy subcommittee.

Budget Hearings

Secretary Napolitano will make two Senate appearances on March 8^th to discuss the DHS budget request; one before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee and the other before the Homeland Security Subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee. Nothing new expected in either hearing.

Admiral Papp will be making two Congressional appearances to discuss the Coast Guard’s budget request for FY 2013; one before the Homeland Security Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee tomorrow and one before the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. The later hearing will be shared with the NOAA Administrator so that will certainly be a shallow hearing on the Coast Guard budget.