Combating Terrorism
Funding Data Reported to Congress Should Be Improved Gao ID: GAO-03-170 November 26, 2002Congress responded to the attacks of September 11, 2001, with dramatic funding increases to combat terrorism. Even before these attacks, Congress was concerned about increased funding in this area, and based on findings from a 1997 GAO report, mandated that the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) report annually on funding to combat terrorism. In this review, GAO was asked to analyze such funding trends, describe difficulties in coordinating combating terrorism budgets, assess data reported to Congress, and describe the executive branch's efforts to maximize the effective use of combating terrorism funds. The review relied on OMB's definition of "combating terrorism" to include both homeland security and overseas combating terrorism missions.
GAO calculated, on the basis of OMB's data, that there was a 276-percent total increase in funds designated to combat terrorism during fiscal years 2001 and 2002 (as reported in OMB's annual reports to Congress for 2001 and 2002, respectively). This increase includes a 106-percent increase from the post-September 11 redefinition of combating terrorism to include homeland security activities such as aviation and transportation security, and a 170-percent increase due to funding increases. Difficulties in coordinating budgets to combat terrorism stem from the variety of missions involved and the fact that activities related to combating terrorism are often funded through budget accounts that also provide funding for other activities. Various approaches have been used to address these challenges. The process for preparing the budget for fiscal year 2003 was characterized by collaboration between OMB and the Office of Homeland Security that resulted in the budget priorities included in the President's budget for fiscal 2003. Crosscutting funding data reported to Congress, however, do not adequately support congressional oversight. An OMB annual report summarizing funding for combating terrorism has had limited utility for decision makers because it was issued late in the congressional decision-making process and did not include data on obligations or on duplication in programs for combating terrorism. OMB plans to analyze areas of duplication as part of the preparation of the budget request for fiscal year 2004. If completed, this analysis will enable OMB to comply with the legislative mandate to include such an analysis in its annual report. While the executive branch has established some national strategies important to coordinating the effective use of funds for combating terrorism, it faces challenges in measuring its progress. Although the strategies provide an important first step, they provide neither clearly defined federal and national performance goals and measures for assessing progress, nor set clear funding priorities. Lacking such measures and priorities, it is also difficult to assess whether funding increases are being allocated to the highest-priority programs.
RecommendationsOur recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.
Director: Team: Phone:GAO-03-170, Combating Terrorism: Funding Data Reported to Congress Should Be Improved
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Report to Congressional Requesters:
November 2002:
Combating Terrorism:
Funding Data Reported to Congress Should Be Improved:
GAO-03-170:
GAO Highlights:
Highlights of GAO-03-170, a report to the Subcommittee on Technology,
Terrorism and Government Information, Senate Committee on the
Judiciary;
the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence; and the House Committee on
the Judiciary.
Why GAO Did This Study:
Congress responded to the attacks of September 11, 2001, with dramatic
funding increases to combat terrorism. Even before these attacks,
Congress
was concerned about increased funding in this area, and based on
findings
from a 1997 GAO report, mandated that the Office of Management and
Budget
(OMB) report annually on funding to combat terrorism. In this review,
GAO
was asked to analyze such funding trends, describe difficulties in
coordinating combating terrorism budgets, assess data reported to
Congress,
and describe the executive branch‘s efforts to maximize the effective
use of
combating terrorism funds.
The review relied on OMB‘s definition of ’combating terrorism“ to
include both
homeland security and overseas combating terrorism missions.
What GAO Found:
GAO calculated, on the basis of OMB‘s data, that there was a 276-
percent total
increase in funds designated to combat terrorism during fiscal
years 2001 and
2002 (as reported in OMB‘s annual reports to Congress for 2001
and 2002,
respectively). This increase includes a 106-percent increase from
the
post-September 11 redefinition of combating terrorism to include
homeland
security activities such as aviation and transportation security,
and a
170-percent increase due to funding increases.
Difficulties in coordinating budgets to combat terrorism stem from
the variety
of missions involved and the fact that activities related to
combating
terrorism are often funded through budget accounts that also provide
funding
for other activities. Various approaches have been used to address
these
challenges. The process for preparing the budget for fiscal year 2003
was
characterized by collaboration between OMB and the Office of Homeland
Security
that resulted in the budget priorities included in the President‘s
budget for
fiscal 2003.
Crosscutting funding data reported to Congress, however, do not
adequately
support congressional oversight. An OMB annual report summarizing
funding for
combating terrorism has had limited utility for decision makers
because it was
issued late in the congressional decision-making process and did
not include
data on obligations or on duplication in programs for combating
terrorism. OMB
plans to analyze areas of duplication as part of the preparation
of the budget
request for fiscal year 2004. If completed, this analysis will
enable OMB to
comply with the legislative mandate to include such an analysis
in its annual
report.
While the executive branch has established some national strategies
important
to coordinating the effective use of funds for combating terrorism,
it faces
challenges in measuring its progress. Although the strategies
provide an
important first step, they provide neither clearly defined federal
and national
performance goals and measures for assessing progress, nor set
clear funding
priorities. Lacking such measures and priorities, it is also
difficult to assess
whether funding increases are being allocated to the highest-
priority programs.
What GAO Recommends:
GAO is making recommendations to improve OMB‘s annual report,
including collecting
and reporting obligation data. It also recommends improvements
to performance
measures in strategies and performance plans related to
combating terrorism.
In comments on a draft of this report, OMB expressed concern
about collecting
obligation data. Other agencies either concurred with the
recommendations or
made no comment.
Contents:
Letter:
Results in Brief:
Conclusions and Recommendations for Executive Action:
Agency Comments and Our Evaluation:
Scope and Methodology:
Briefing Section I: Introduction:
Briefing Section II: Funding Analysis:
Briefing Section III: Coordination and Priority Setting:
Briefing Section IV: Data Reported to Congress:
Briefing Section V: Potential for Overlap:
Briefing Section VI: Challenges in Effective Use of Funds:
Appendixes:
Appendix I: Comments from the Department of Defense:
Appendix II: Comments from the Department of State:
Appendix III: GAO Contacts and Acknowledgments:
Related GAO Products:
Tables:
Table 1: Departments and Agencies Contacted during GAO‘s Review and
Their Share of Funding for Combating Terrorism from the President‘s
Budget Request for Fiscal Year 2003 of $45 Billion:
Table 2: Federal Entities‘ Percentage of Funding for Combating
Terrorism:
Table 3: Timeline of Budget Events Occurring around September 11, 2001:
Abbreviations:
ATF: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms:
DHS: Department of Homeland Security:
DOD: Department of Defense :
FBI: Federal Bureau of Investigations:
FEMA: Federal Emergency Management Agency:
GAO: General Accounting Office:
HHS: Department of Health and Human Services:
NSC: National Security Council:
OHS: Office of Homeland Security:
OMB: Office of Management and Budget:
PART: Program Assessment Rating Tool:
November 26, 2002:
Congressional Requesters:
In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, the
administration and Congress raised the federal government‘s emphasis on
combating terrorism through increased appropriations, organizational
changes, and legislative proposals to establish the Department of
Homeland Security. While the President‘s budget request for fiscal year
2003 elevated the importance of combating terrorism by making homeland
security one of the administration‘s top priorities, funding to combat
terrorism had been steadily increasing even prior to the September 11
attacks.[Footnote 1] Understanding funding trends as well as the budget
processes used to make resource decisions will be key to developing
future funding initiatives, particularly as Congress considers funding
priorities as well as the implications of establishing the proposed
Department of Homeland Security. At the time we finalized this report,
the Department had not been established.
On the basis of findings from a 1997 GAO report, Congress required the
Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to report annually on funding to
combat terrorism. You requested that we review such funding for fiscal
years 1998 through 2003. In September 2002, we briefed staff in your
offices on our preliminary findings. As agreed with your offices, this
report:
* provides a trend analysis of funds used to combat terrorism,
* describes the difficulties in coordinating budgets to combat
terrorism across agencies and the efforts to address them,
* assesses the adequacy of crosscutting data on funding to combat
terrorism reported to Congress,
* discusses the efforts to identify and minimize potential areas of
duplication, and:
* describes the challenges faced by the executive branch in maximizing
the effectiveness of these funds.
Results in Brief:
The upward climb of federal government funding to combat terrorism in
the years prior to the attacks of September 11, 2001, was dwarfed by
the dramatic funding increases that occurred afterward. These latter
increases occurred as budget priorities quickly shifted to missions for
combating terrorism and as the scope of combating terrorism was
redefined to include homeland security missions, such as border and
transportation security. As a result, funds designated for combating
terrorism increased 276 percent from fiscal year 2001 through fiscal
2002 (106 percent due to changes in definition and scope, and 170
percent due to funding increases), as reported in OMB‘s annual reports
to Congress on combating terrorism.[Footnote 2] In the same time frame,
the Department of Defense and other national security agencies received
the largest share of funds for combating terrorism (over 30 percent),
although the Department of Health and Human Services‘ (HHS) and the
Federal Emergency Management Agency‘s (FEMA) shares of such funds have
risen substantially. There has also been a change in priorities among
mission categories for combating terrorism as defined by OMB. Since
fiscal year 2001, funding priorities have shifted from the physical
security of government and the national populace and investigative,
intelligence, and offensive activities to research and development
related to combating terrorism and preparing and responding to
terrorist incidents.
The executive branch is faced with several difficulties in coordinating
funding to combat terrorism, and approaches to such coordination have
varied. The difficulties include (1) the large number of agencies
involved; (2) the wide variety of missions represented, including
intelligence, law enforcement, health services, and environmental
protection; and (3) the global nature of missions for combating
terrorism. In addition, funding for missions for combating terrorism is
often subsumed in budget accounts that provide funding for other
activities. Over the past 4 years, various approaches to coordinating
budget requests prior to and during OMB‘s review have been employed to
address these challenges. For example, during the fiscal year 2001 and
2002 budget processes, interagency working groups led by OMB and the
National Security Council (NSC) made recommendations prior to the
agencies‘ formal submissions to OMB. During the period immediately
following September 11, 2001, the greatest attention was given to those
activities for combating terrorism related to homeland security. As a
result, coordination for the budget process for fiscal year 2003 was
primarily between OMB and the newly created Office of Homeland Security
(OHS). Together, these offices set priorities that resulted in the
budget initiatives for homeland security included in the President‘s
budget for fiscal year 2003. Efforts to coordinate the budget request
for fiscal year 2004 are characterized by uncertainties with agencies‘
development of budgets in the face of the evolving status and structure
of the proposed Department of Homeland Security and delays in final
appropriations for fiscal 2003.
Crosscutting funding data reported to Congress do not adequately
support congressional oversight. OMB‘s annual reports to Congress on
combating terrorism, which summarizes proposed spending, is not as
useful a tool as it might be for effective congressional oversight,
partly because (1) recent reports have been published well after the
March 1 deadline and (2) the report does not include data on
obligations. Although legislation mandating OMB‘s report does not
require the presentation of data on obligations for all programs and
activities for combating terrorism, we believe that such data are
important for understanding the current status of funding and
establishing future funding priorities. Also, a common structure to
categorize combating terrorism activities among key governmentwide
reports is lacking, and the categories cannot be linked to
appropriations accounts--the structure used by Congress to fund
programs and activities. Consequently, there is no transparency for
making policy choices and trade-offs between combating terrorism and
other activities. OMB has taken an important step to improve the data
used to develop its fiscal 2004 budget request to Congress by requiring
agencies to identify funds for combating terrorism by account--the
level at which funds are appropriated--in OMB‘s centralized budget
database (known as the MAX database). However, the guidance did not
require agencies to report on obligations.
Potential duplication of effort has been identified in our past
reviews, and the administration has made efforts to minimize such
duplication. We have found in the past that there is a risk of
duplication in areas such as assistance to state and local governments,
information management and technology, and research and development,
and we recommended that a focal point for combating terrorism be
established to better coordinate such programs. In addition, we
reported that OMB has not included an analysis of potential duplication
as part of its annual reports to date, as required in the 1997
legislation establishing the reporting requirement. In the wake of the
September 11 attacks, the President established focal points for
homeland security and combating terrorism overseas--the Assistant to
the President for Homeland Security in OHS and the Director for
Combating Terrorism within the NSC, respectively. Furthermore, the
administration anticipates that the proposed Department of Homeland
Security would address some areas of duplication. However, the proposed
Department will exclude some agencies with homeland security missions
and, therefore, could not address all areas of potential duplication
without interagency coordination. OMB has stated that it plans to
review the budget proposal for fiscal year 2004 to identify areas of
duplication. Such an analysis, if reported, would increase the
visibility of potential duplication areas to Congress.
While the executive branch has established some national strategies
important to maximizing the effective use of funds for combating
terrorism, it faces challenges in measuring progress against its goals.
The administration has published two of three national strategies
intended to address the terrorist threat both domestically and
internationally. The National Strategy for Homeland Security provides
an important first step in establishing strategic objectives and
mission areas, and proposes to consolidate the administration of these
functions in the proposed Department of Homeland Security. The strategy
also directs Departments and agencies to create performance measures by
which progress can be measured and future resources allocated. However,
at the federal and national levels, for the most part, the strategy
does not provide performance goals and measures to assess progress and
improve preparedness, nor does it set clear funding priorities among
and within the various initiatives. In the absence of clear performance
goals, measures, and funding priorities, it is difficult to assess
whether funding increases are being allocated to the highest-priority
programs. Notwithstanding incomplete guidance from the national
strategies, some Departments and agencies have either updated or are in
the process of updating strategic and performance plans to reflect
priorities for combating terrorism. For combating terrorism overseas,
the President issued the National Security Strategy of the United
States of America, but the National Strategy for Combating Terrorism is
still pending.
Conclusions and Recommendations for Executive Action:
Congressional decision makers require governmentwide information on
funding for combating terrorism (including obligations) in a timely
fashion. In preparing the fiscal year 2004 budget request to Congress,
OMB is requiring agencies to provide information on combating terrorism
(including homeland security) so that funding for these activities can
be identified by account--the level at which funds are appropriated. If
made available to Congress, this information should greatly improve the
transparency of funding requested for combating terrorism programs and
activities within Departments and across the federal government.
Although this is an important first step, OMB has not required agencies
to separately identify obligations for relevant programs and
activities. Without obligation information, it is impossible to know
(1) how much funding from prior years is still available to potentially
offset new requests, (2) whether the rate of spending for a program is
slower than anticipated, or (3) what the level of effort (i.e., the
size of the program) is for a particular year as well as for a program
over time.
OMB‘s annual report on funding for combating terrorism summarizes
funding data for the current and next fiscal years, and is supposed to
be issued by March 1 of each year and identify duplication of efforts.
To be a useful tool, we believe it should also include obligation data
for the reasons described above. However, the report has had limited
utility because it (1) has been issued in the late spring and summer--
late in the congressional budget decision-making process, (2) does not
include data on obligations, and (3) neglects to identify areas of
duplication.
It is important for the government to establish federal-and national-
level goals and performance measures to maximize the effectiveness of
funds to combat terrorism. The administration has made progress in
publishing national strategies to address priorities for combating
terrorism, but these strategies do not include governmentwide
performance measures. Establishing these priorities will be critical
for individual agencies in aligning their strategic and performance
plans, including performance measures, with governmentwide strategic
direction and guidance.
On the basis of these conclusions, we make the following
recommendations.
* To help Congress obtain timely information on spending that supports
the President‘s annual budget request for combating terrorism, OMB
should require agencies to provide information on obligations in its
MAX database--the database used by OMB to produce the President‘s
annual budget request.
* To improve the usefulness of OMB‘s Annual Report to Congress on
Combating Terrorism, OMB should:
* publish the report by the required March 1 deadline to provide
information for congressional budget deliberations;
* include obligations as reported in the MAX database; and:
* include, as required by Congress, an analysis of areas where overlap
in programs could result in unnecessary duplication of effort.
* To help maximize the effective use of funds for combating terrorism,
* OHS and NSC should include national-level, as well as federal
governmentwide, performance measures as a supplement to existing
strategies and in future revisions to strategies for homeland security
and the combating of terrorism overseas and:
* OMB, in conjunction with OHS and NSC, should direct relevant
Departments to develop or enhance performance objectives and measures
for combating terrorism in alignment with performance measures in
national strategies, and include performance measures for combating
terrorism in the governmentwide plan that OMB is required to produce
annually.
Agency Comments and Our Evaluation:
In October 2002, we requested comments on a draft of this report from
the Director of OMB; the Secretaries of Defense, Energy, Health and
Human Services, State, Transportation, and the Treasury; the Attorney
General of the United States; the Administrator of the Environmental
Protection Agency; and the Director of the Federal Emergency Management
Agency. In addition, copies of the report were made available to OHS
and NSC for their comment.
In oral comments on the report, OMB staff questioned whether the value
added of collecting obligation data related to combating terrorism
would be worth the effort. While OMB staff acknowledged that OMB
examiners use obligation data in assessing the appropriateness of
agency budget requests overall, they felt that budget authority data
provide the most insight into combating terrorism programs and
facilitate follow up on areas of concern. Furthermore, they explained
that, in the MAX database, obligation data are collected for specific
programs that correspond to major agency activities, and these
activities may or may not line up with combating terrorism programs.
Aligning these activities with combating terrorism programs would
require splitting up agency activities in the MAX database, which are
familiar and useful, into terrorism-specific activities. Therefore, OMB
staff suggested these obligations would more likely have to be
collected and/or displayed through a parallel process outside the MAX
database. Targeting such an effort on obligations would not be the most
productive way to provide more insight into combating terrorism
priorities or to enhance the value of the Annual Report, according to
the officials.
We agree with OMB that budget authority data provide valuable insights
into programs. However, we disagree that obligation data related to
combating terrorism also are not worth collecting and reporting. First,
we believe that the very reason why OMB examiners find the obligation
data useful to them is the same reason that congressional decision
makers would find the data useful--obligation data gives decision
makers an insight as to whether programs are being run according to
plans established by their budget projections. We acknowledge that
collecting these data would pose an additional workload on both OMB and
agency budget officials, but believe that such a workload is warranted
in light of the high priority placed on this issue. OMB itself gave the
issue high priority when it required agencies to report on budget
authority data according to combating terrorism categories, including
homeland security. Furthermore, the creation of the Department of
Homeland Security will make this type of detailed information more
important, as the Executive Branch tries to integrate 22 agencies into
the Department. Finally, for some of the programs related to combating
terrorism, the law establishing the reporting requirement already
requires OMB to report obligation data.
We also received comments from other Departments and agencies. DOD
concurred with our recommendations to OMB and its comments are
reprinted in appendix I. The State Department also concurred with our
recommendations. In its comments, the State Department cited its
efforts in various coordination activities and its plans to improve its
performance planning and measurement. As an example, the Department
established the Office of Strategic and Performance Planning to improve
strategic plans and ensure that funding is linked to such plans. The
State Department‘s comments are reprinted in appendix II. FEMA
concurred with our recommendations in oral comments to the report. OHS
and NSC did not provide comments on our recommendations to them. The
remaining Departments and agencies informed us that they had no
substantive comments on the report. Technical comments from OMB, the
Department of Defense, and the Environmental Protection Agency were
incorporated as appropriate.
Scope and Methodology:
Our scope includes federal Departments and agencies that have key
missions for combating terrorism and, when combined, represent 97
percent of the total funding requested for combating terrorism in the
presidential budget request for fiscal year 2003, as shown in table 1.
Table 1: Departments and Agencies Contacted during GAO‘s Review and
Their Share of Funding for Combating Terrorism from the President‘s
Budget Request for Fiscal Year 2003 of $45 Billion:
Department/Agency: National Security[A]; Percent of funding to combat
terrorism: 32.
Department/Agency: Department of Transportation; Percent of funding to
combat terrorism: 16.
Department/Agency: Department of Justice; Percent of funding to combat
terrorism: 16.
Department/Agency: Department of Health and Human Services; Percent of
funding to combat terrorism: 10.
Department/Agency: Federal Emergency Management Agency; Percent of
funding to combat terrorism: 8.
Department/Agency: The Treasury; Percent of funding to combat
terrorism: 6.
Department/Agency: Department of State; Percent of funding to combat
terrorism: 5.
Department/Agency: Department of Energy; Percent of funding to combat
terrorism: 3.
Department/Agency: Environmental Protection Agency; Percent of funding
to combat terrorism: 1.
Department/Agency: Other; Percent of funding to combat terrorism: 3.
Department/Agency: Total; Percent of funding to combat terrorism: 100.
Source: OMB, 2002 Annual Report to Congress on Combating Terrorism,
June 2002.
[A] National Security includes Department of Defense and intelligence
community funding combined to keep figures unclassified. Because the
intelligence community includes intelligence elements from the
Departments of State, Energy, the Treasury and Justice, the percentages
displayed for these Departments do not represent the entirety of these
Departments‘ budgets for combating terrorism.
[End of table]
In addition, our scope included OMB, OHS, and NSC. We did not include
classified intelligence agencies‘ budgets in detail. Intelligence
community agencies and their corresponding classified budgets will be
included in a separate review by the Senate Select Committee on
Intelligence.
To analyze funding trends of federal funding to combat terrorism, we
relied on OMB‘s annual reports containing data from fiscal year 1998
through the budget request for fiscal year 2003. The 2002 report
included data from the emergency supplemental appropriation signed into
law on September 18, 2001, but did not include data from a second
emergency supplemental appropriation signed into law on August 2,
2002.[Footnote 3] Although OMB provided us data from the August 2002
appropriation, we did not receive the data in time to incorporate into
our report.
We used the definitions from the OMB annual reports, as summarized
below:
* Homeland security: Activities within the United States coordinated by
OHS.
* Overseas combating terrorism: Activities outside the United States
coordinated by NSC, excluding direct military actions.
* Combating terrorism: Combination of homeland security and overseas
combating terrorism, further divided into four main categories:
* Research and development: Developing technologies to deter, prevent,
or mitigate acts of terrorism.
* Preparing for and responding to terrorist incidents: Planning,
training, equipment, and personnel directed at incident response.
* Physical security of government and national populace: Protecting
federally owned, leased, occupied facilities; federal employees,
including high-ranking officials, and the national populace from
terrorist acts as well as physical protection of the national
infrastructure.
* Investigative, intelligence, and offensive capabilities: Reducing the
ability of groups or individuals to commit terrorist acts, and the
investigation of terrorist acts when they occur and prosecution of
their perpetrators.
To describe difficulties in coordinating budgets to combat terrorism
and efforts to address them, we reviewed data from OMB and OHS. In
addition, we evaluated data from Departments and agencies with critical
missions for combating terrorism, as well as data from our previous
reports. We conducted interviews with knowledgeable officials and
discussed their views on the effectiveness of interagency approaches.
To assess the adequacy of funding data reported to Congress, we
compared OMB‘s annual reports with the legislative requirement for
drafting the reports and identified potential areas for improvement on
the basis of other common budget presentations. To identify areas of
potential duplication of effort among agencies and the efforts to
minimize them, we relied on our past and ongoing analyses of programs
for combating terrorism and reviewed the administration‘s proposals for
minimizing such duplication. To identify the challenges faced by the
executive branch in maximizing the effectiveness of funds for combating
terrorism, we relied on our recent analyses of national strategies and
interviewed key agency officials to determine whether performance plans
were updated to reflect revised missions for combating terrorism.
Our work was conducted from March through September 2002 in accordance
with generally accepted government auditing standards.
We will send copies of this report to appropriate congressional
committees and to the federal agencies and offices discussed in this
report. We will make copies available to other interested parties upon
request. In addition, the report will be available at no charge on the
GAO Web site at http://www.gao.gov.
If you or your staff have any questions about this report, please
contact Raymond Decker at (202) 512-6020 or Paul Posner at (202) 512-
9573. Major contributors to this report are listed in appendix III.
Signed by Raymond J. Decker:
Raymond J. Decker
Director
Defense Capabilities and Management:
Signed by Paul L. Posner:
Paul L. Posner
Managing Director
Strategic Issues:
List of Congressional Requesters:
The Honorable Dianne Feinstein
Chairman
The Honorable Jon Kyl
Ranking Minority Member
Subcommittee on Technology,
Terrorism and Government Information
Committee on the Judiciary
U.S. Senate:
The Honorable Bob Graham
Chairman
The Honorable Richard C. Shelby
Ranking Minority Member
Select Committee on Intelligence
U.S. Senate:
The Honorable James F. Sensenbrenner, Jr.
Chairman
The Honorable John Conyers, Jr.
Ranking Minority Member
Committee on the Judiciary
House of Representatives:
[End of section]
Briefing Section I: Introduction:
[See PDF for image]
[End of figure]
In a 1997 report, we found that the Office of Management and Budget
(OMB) and the National Security Council (NSC) did not regularly
collect, aggregate, and review data on funding to combat terrorism on a
governmentwide basis for the many Departments and agencies involved in
combating terrorism.[Footnote 4] On the basis of our findings, Congress
required OMB to establish a reporting system on the budgeting and
expenditure of such funds, and, since 1998, OMB has been required to
prepare both a classified and an unclassified report on combating
terrorism to Congress by March 1 of each year.[Footnote 5]
The report must:
* include a list of proposed amounts to be expended for programs for
combating terrorism and activities in the current and next fiscal year,
* describe specific programs and activities,
* list priorities with respect to programs and activities,
* summarize obligations and expenditures on domestic emergency
preparedness for terrorist incidents involving weapons of mass
destruction, and:
* identify duplication of efforts.
The 2002 OMB report provides funding and programmatic information on 27
federal entities that have received funds for combating terrorism.
These federal entities are responsible for the federal government‘s
efforts to combat terrorist activity both domestically and overseas,
including defense against terrorist incidents involving weapons of mass
destruction. After the September 11 attacks, OMB included an analysis
of homeland security as part of its June 2002 report.
[See PDF for image]
[End of figure]
Departments‘ and agencies‘ submissions of their budget requests for
fiscal year 2003 to OMB coincided closely with the attacks of September
11, 2001. In response to the attacks, the first of two emergency
supplemental appropriations, totaling $40 billion--of which $12 billion
was provided for the combating terrorism mission--was signed into law
on September 18, 2001.[Footnote 6]The remaining $28 billion from that
supplemental appropriation was provided for other missions, such as
military actions overseas and recovery at the attack sites. Since this
supplemental appropriation was enacted in the last 2-week period of
fiscal year 2001, most of these funds were not available to agencies
for obligation until fiscal year 2002 and were allocated over several
months. The second supplemental appropriation was signed into law on
August 2, 2002.[Footnote 7]
Other key events occurred to influence funding decisions as OMB
considered what requests should be included in the emergency
supplemental appropriation, reviewed agencies‘ budget requests for
fiscal year 2003, and notified agencies of funding decisions in late
November during a process known as ’passback.“ On October 4, 2001, the
first known victim of the anthrax attack died, drawing more attention
to funding needed to counter the threat from biological weapons. On
October 8, 2001, the Office of Homeland Security (OHS) was established
and given responsibility for developing a national strategy for
homeland security and related homeland security activities, including
certifying that budget requests for homeland security were necessary
and appropriate. On November 19, 2001, the Transportation Security
Administration was established, with a budget request of $4.8 billion
for fiscal year 2003.[Footnote 8]
On February 4, 2002, the President submitted the budget request for
fiscal year 2003 to Congress. OMB‘s 2002 Annual Report on Combating
Terrorism, which includes data from the request for fiscal year 2003,
was issued in June 2002.
In the spring and summer of 2002, offices within the Executive Office
of the President issued guidance related to preparing the budget
request for fiscal year 2004. On April 24, 2002, OMB issued initial
budget guidance indicating that homeland security was one of the key
priorities for fiscal year 2004. In June 2002, OMB issued the A-11
Circular, which outlined guidance for the preparation, submission, and
execution of the budget to the agencies. In the summer of 2002, the
President issued two documents that OMB cited as key guidance for
agencies to develop budget requests for fiscal year 2004 and
performance plans: the proposal for the new Department of Homeland
Security and the National Strategy for Homeland Security. Establishing
the Department of Homeland Security was under Congress‘s consideration
at the time of our review.
[End of section]
Briefing Section II: Funding Analysis:
[See PDF for image]
[End of figure]
In the years prior to the September 11 attacks, we reported on a rapid
increase in the number of federal programs and funding to combat
terrorism that spanned multiple agencies. These included (1) programs
for training and equipping first responders to address chemical,
biological, radiological, and nuclear terrorist attacks and (2) federal
teams capable of analyzing such weapons, containing terrorist
incidents, and providing medical support or response.[Footnote 9] We
also reported on significant funding increases, as well as improvements
in OMB‘s efforts to track funding related to combating terrorism.
After the September 11 attacks, the missions and funding for combating
terrorism were dramatically expanded. Most notably, a new group of
homeland security activities--such as border and aviation security--was
included under the definition ’combating terrorism.“ Since September
11, $12 billion has been appropriated for missions to combat terrorism
in a supplemental appropriation, and an additional $45 billion has been
requested in the budget request for fiscal year 2003.[Footnote 10]
[See PDF for image]
[End of figure]
As shown in the figure, scope changes and funding increases resulted in
a 276-percent surge between 2001 and 2002 (as reported in OMB‘s Annual
Reports for 2001 and 2002, respectively). A 106-percent increase is
attributed to changes in definition to broaden the scope of combating
terrorism, such as the addition of border and homeland security, and a
170-percent increase is attributed to increased funding overall.
It is difficult to discuss historical trends in funding for combating
terrorism because of the changing scope of programs and activities
included before and after the September 11 attacks. In each of the last
5 years, OMB has issued its Annual Report to Congress on Combating
Terrorism, which attempts to capture, across the federal government,
total spending on combating terrorism and, in the most recent report,
related homeland security initiatives. However, as more programs are
included in the definition of ’combating terrorism,“ funding
comparisons become more complicated. We therefore were unable to
determine a funding trend by agency or mission category (including the
homeland security initiatives) prior to 2001.
[See PDF for image]
[A] The emergency supplemental figure includes the emergency
supplemental appropriation enacted in September 2001 but does not
include the emergency supplemental appropriation enacted in August
2002. Moreover, it includes only the $12 billion designated by OMB as
funds for combating terrorism, not the entire $40 billion
appropriation.
[End of figure]
In dollar terms, on the basis of the definition that OMB used in its
2002 report, funding for all federal entities with missions for
combating terrorism increased following the attacks. In percentage
terms, National Security agencies consistently received the highest
proportion of funds, but their share of these funds decreased after
September 11, whereas the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)
and the Federal Emergency Management Agency‘s (FEMA) proportion of
funds for combating terrorism increased substantially. Most other
agencies received a smaller portion of the total funds provided after
the attacks, as shown in table 2.
Table 2: Federal Entities‘ Percentage of Funding for Combating
Terrorism:
Federal entity: National Security; Percentage of funding for combating
terrorism: Preattack funding: Fiscal year 2001 ($20 billion): 39;
Fiscal
year 2002 enacted pre-Sept. 11 ($24 billion): 36; Postattack funding:
Emergency Supplemental Appropriation enacted Sept. 2001($12 billion):
27;
Fiscal year 2003 budget request($45 billion): 32.
Federal entity: Department of Transportation; Percentage of funding for
combating terrorism: Preattack funding: Fiscal year 2001 ($20 billion):
12; Fiscal year 2002 enacted pre-Sept. 11 ($24 billion): 17; Postattack
funding: Emergency Supplemental Appropriation enacted Sept. 2001
($12 billion): 10; Fiscal year 2003 budget request ($45 billion): 16.
Federal entity: Department of Justice; Percentage of funding for
combating terrorism: Preattack funding: Fiscal year 2001 ($20 billion):
23; Fiscal year 2002 enacted pre-Sept. 11 ($24 billion): 21; Postattack
funding: Emergency Supplemental Appropriation enacted Sept. 2001
($12 billion): 18; Fiscal year 2003 budget request ($45 billion): 16.
Federal entity: Department of Health and Human Services; Percentage of
funding for combating terrorism: Preattack funding: Fiscal year 2001
($20 billion): 2; Fiscal year 2002 enacted pre-Sept. 11 ($24 billion):
1; Postattack funding: Emergency Supplemental Appropriation enacted
Sept. 2001 ($12 billion): 22; Fiscal year 2003 budget request
($45 billion): 10.
Federal entity: Federal Emergency Management Agency; Percentage of
funding for combating terrorism: Preattack funding: Fiscal year 2001
($20 billion):
