Job Vacancies At DHS Said To Hurt U.S. Preparedness

For Deputy Secretary Michael P. Jackson, Knocke said, "planning for the transition is a huge part of how he spends his time each day -- to ensure that we have the right caliber of leaders in the number-two and -three positions at our component agencies and program offices, so that they are well trained, well experienced and ready."

Nevertheless, congressional auditors, management consultants and academic experts on government have warned that several trends are undercutting efforts to improve DHS management. The department faces high turnover because top officials are in demand in a private sector willing to pay lucrative salaries. It is heavily dependent on contractors, yet its staff to manage them is overstretched. Partisan political combat over homeland security issues has also made jobs less attractive.

Homeland Security employees reported the lowest job satisfaction among 36 federal agencies in a January survey by the OPM. The average tenure of the Secret Service director has dropped from 10 years during the past century to less than three years since 1992, and the agency has had three directors since it was moved into the DHS.

The head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Julie L. Myers, has served as a recess appointment unconfirmed by the Senate since 2005, when she came under fire by lawmakers who challenged her political connections and management qualifications.

Knocke said Congress has "sent the wrong message to employees" at times by attacking individual appointees and agencies, rather than "ensuring that they have confident leadership in place and the support of Congress behind that leadership and that agency."

Among those who have been questioned by congressional Democrats is W. Ross Ashley III, nominated by President Bush as head of a newly consolidated FEMA office overseeing billions in federal grants. Ashley was a senior executive for a DHS contractor, ChoicePoint, and has not worked in federal grant-making. FEMA remains a sensitive agency politically because of the prevalence of Bush political allies among its leadership at the time of Katrina, including ousted director Michael D. Brown.

David Heyman, homeland security director at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, agreed that congressional battles over Iraq and immigration have created political distractions for the DHS. But he said that only senior leaders can make the new department succeed.

"The department has had great challenges forging a new entity out of 22 parts," Heyman said. "It's not the staff-level or civil servants who will be forging e pluribus unum -- out of many, one. It's the leadership that makes a difference."

Davis, the Virginia Republican, said that political appointees often leave administrations for new opportunities at this point in a president's term and that bureaucratic limits on government pay and hiring are legitimate problems.

But, Davis added: "This is an area where you can't afford to have these vacancies. The American people are counting on the administration to have these positions filled. This is our first line of defense in the fight against terrorism. You have to make it a priority."