1. Paying for Homeland Security: Show Me the Money
- Author:
- Cindy Williams
- Publication Date:
- 04-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- MIT Center for International Studies
- Abstract:
- In January 2003, the Bush administration drew 22 dis- parate agencies and some 170,000 employees into a new Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Proponents of the reorganization hoped a single department under a single cabi- net secretary would foster unity of effort across a substantial portion of the federal activities related to domestic security. A key tool would be the department’s budget. With all the agencies beholden to him for their money, the secretary could promote and reward much-needed integration across the department. He could wield the budget tool to expand high priority activities, eliminate or defer the less important or redundant ones, and reallocate the workforce to fill gaps in high-risk areas. A look at budgets since the department was established reflects little in the way of realignment, however. Department funding rose by more than 40 percent between 2003 and 2007, but there has been only minimal reallocation of bud- gets from areas of lower risk or priority to functions the department says are more important. With the exception of added spending to support the Secure Border Initiative announced by President Bush in November 2005, the depart- ment’s main operating components each enjoy about the same share of the DHS budget today as they did when the department was created.1 The result is that— despite the heavy cost in both dollars and institutional disruption—the United States is not getting what it should out of the reorganization.
- Topic:
- Defense Policy, Military Affairs, Budget, and Homeland Security
- Political Geography:
- United States