Mr. President, I rise today to join my colleagues Senators Lieberman and Collins in introducing The Homeland Security Interagency and Interjurisdictional Information Sharing Act of 2004, a piece of legislation critical to improving the communication capabilities of first responders and among all levels of government.
One of the most important lessons our Nation learned on September 11th is that information sharing, both between agencies and levels of government and between emergency first responders, is critical to the prevention of and response to a terrorist attack on our homeland. There has much been much talk about breaking down stove pipes and fully equipping our heroic first responders in the past three years, but this bill points out those goals have not yet been met.
The world watched as firefighters perished in the World Trade Center because their radios could not function inside the buildings and they did not have updated information about the imminent collapse of the towers. Ten months later it was reported that officers responding to a shooting at Los Angeles International Airport missed crucial information because they were not using the same radio frequency.
Yet almost all cities and counties in the United States still lack an interoperable communications system today and many still lack the infrastructure to provide one hundred percent coverage for the radio systems they do have. In my home state of Hawaii, first responders are unable to communicate through radios in twenty-five percent of the Island of Hawaii because of a combination of lack of infrastructure and diverse geography.
This problem can be solved, but it will require a commitment of not only funding but planning, communication, and cooperation. The current SAFECOM initiative, which is supposed to address the interoperability problem, has failed in most, if not all, of these areas. While this issue clearly cannot be solved by one agency alone, the cross-government nature of SAFECOM crippled the program from the start. SAFECOM is supposed to be funded by multiple agencies meaning that if one agency is not in agreement with the others it can withhold funding and slow or stop activities. This formula has proven ineffective.
The Homeland Security Interagency and Interjurisdictional Information Sharing Act will address these issues. The bill creates an Office of Information Sharing within the Department of Homeland Security to develop and implement a national strategy and provide the leadership, outreach, and technical assistance necessary to achieve interoperability. The new office would receive a direct line of funding for its operations as well as to provide grants to states and localities to develop interoperable networks.
The bill would also require the Secretary of Homeland Security to develop a Homeland Security Information Sharing Network. The problem of informational stove piping will not be eradicated with ad hoc measures as is the practice today. The Administration must institutionalize a system of sharing critical homeland security information among all levels of government. We are no longer in a "need to know" world. We must switch to a "need to share" mentality.
Three years is too long for the lessons of September 11th to not be implemented. I urge my colleagues to support this important piece of legislation and I thank Senators Lieberman and Collins for their work on this issue.
