Floor Statements

Madam President, I rise as a cosponsor of a bipartisan amendment that will provide targeted reforms to the Federal Employee Retirement System in order to be more effective and equitable for our past, current, and future Federal employees. I am joining Senators Lieberman, Akaka, and Voinovich in this effort.

First, I would like to highlight a provision that I was pleased to introduce earlier this year as a bipartisan stand-alone measure with Senators Voinovich, Kohl, and McCaskill.

This portion of the amendment would establish a 5-year pilot project allowing agencies to hire back Federal retirees for a limited period of time without having to offset their salaries by the amount of their annuities. This will strengthen the Federal Government's ability to serve the public, particularly at a time when agencies face a wave of retirement of highly experienced employees and there exists a critical need for these skilled employees.

Across the government, our agencies face a host of challenging missions that require focused leadership and vigilant oversight. In Afghanistan, our government faces an increasing demand for development experts. As the government implements the Recovery Act, experienced auditors are in high demand to ensure funds are spent wisely.

On average, however, retirements from the Federal workforce have exceeded 50,000 a year for a decade. The numbers will certainly rise in the near future. The Office of Personnel Management calculates that 60 percent of the current Federal workforce, whose civilian component approaches 3 million people, will be eligible to retire during the coming 10 years.

This baby boom retirement wave will have another impact. It will cause a sudden acceleration in the loss of accumulated skills and mentoring capabilities that experienced workers possess.

The amendment we offer today would provide a limited, but vital, measure of relief to agencies who could benefit from the skills, knowledge, and productivity of federal retirees. It provides an opportunity for Federal agencies to reemploy retirees without requiring them to take pay cuts based on the amount of their annuity payment.

With some exceptions, retirees can currently return to work without having their salaries reduced only if OPM grants a waiver for the reemployment. This creates a disincentive for experienced Federal retirees to return to Federal service--preventing their knowledge and experience from filling critical agency needs.

The cumbersome waiver process also dissuades agencies from considering annuitants when evaluating their overall workforce strategy.

Congress has already provided exceptions to this rule. Both GAO and the Department of Defense have utilized this authority to rehire skilled annuitants to meet important mission requirements.

Other agencies, especially those charged with overseeing the stimulus and TARP funds, need the same ability to hire back experienced workers. Acting Comptroller General Gene Dodaro has indicated that the ability to reemploy annuitants without salary offset is a critical authority that GAO uses whenever a surge in staffing is necessary.

This amendment would grant the opportunity for Federal agencies, on a limited basis, to reemploy retirees without requiring them to take pay cuts based on their annuity payment or to wait for OPM to grant a waiver.

While providing needed flexibility for agencies to meet mission critical responsibilities, the amendment would also strictly prescribe the periods of time for which retirees can be rehired, thereby preventing agencies from relying solely on retirees instead of hiring a new crop of employees to fill the ranks behind our seasoned employees as they retire.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, this provision will not cost the Federal Government any additional money. The returning annuitants' health and life insurance benefits would be unaffected by their part-time work, and the government would not need to make any additional contributions to the annuitant's retirement plan. Thus, even without making any allowance for the positive effects of these returning employees' organizational knowledge, commitment, productivity, and mentoring potential, their reemployment may actually produce a net savings for taxpayers.

This reform would also provide some much needed hiring flexibilities for agencies, given the expertise the Federal Government will need to effectively implement and oversee the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. The Chair of the Council of Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency, in testimony before the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, agreed with this point, and the council has sent a letter endorsing this authority.

The ability to rehire Federal retirees would also help strengthen the Federal acquisition workforce. The Federal Government has entered the 21st century with 22 percent fewer Federal civilian acquisition personnel than it had at the start of the 1990s. Moreover, as early as 2012, 50 percent of the entire Federal acquisition workforce will be eligible to retire. This amendment will help shore up this workforce at a critical time.

The bill I originally introduced with this provision has been endorsed by the Partnership for Public Service, National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association, Federally Employed Women, the Government Managers Coalition, and the National Council on Aging.

Beyond this provision, the amendment also corrects an inequity between the two Federal retirement systems--FERS and CSRS. Current law compensates CSRS employees at the time of their retirement for the unused portion of the sick leave that they accrued over the course of their Federal careers. Employees under FERS are not provided similar compensation. This creates an unfair disparity within the Federal workforce which this amendment would rectify.

This amendment includes many provisions that would help to strengthen the Federal workforce, attracting highly skilled and talented employees at a time when they are desperately needed. I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.

Mr. President, I rise today with my colleagues from Arkansas and Missouri to introduce the Medicare Rural Home Health Payment Fairness Act to reinstate the 5 percent add-on payment for home health services in rural areas that expired on January 1, 2007.

Home health has become an increasingly important part of our health care system. The kinds of highly skilled--and often technically complex--services that our Nation's home health caregivers provide have enabled millions of our most frail and vulnerable older and disabled citizens to avoid hospitals and nursing homes and stay just where they want to be--in the comfort and security of their own homes. I have accompanied several of Maine's caring home health nurses on their visits to some of their patients. I have seen first hand the difference that they are making for Maine's elderly.

Surveys have shown that the delivery of home health services in rural areas can be as much as 12 to 15 percent more costly because of the extra travel time required to cover long distances between patients, higher transportation expenses, and other factors. Because of the longer travel times, rural caregivers are unable to make as many visits in a day as their urban counterparts. The executive director of the Visiting Nurses of Aroostook in Northern Maine, where I am from, tells me her agency covers 6,600 square miles with a total population of only 73,000. This agency's costs are understandably much higher than other agencies due to the long distances the staff must drive to see clients. Moreover, the staff is not able to see as many patients due to time on the road.

Agencies in rural areas are also frequently smaller than their urban counterparts, which means that their relative costs are higher. Smaller agencies with fewer patients and fewer visits mean that fixed costs, particularly those associated with meeting regulatory requirements, are spread over a much smaller number of patients and visits, increasing overall per-patient and per-visit costs.

Moreover, in many rural areas, home health agencies are the primary caregivers for homebound beneficiaries with limited access to transportation. These rural patients often require more time and care than their urban counterparts, and are understandably more expensive for agencies to serve. If the extra rural payment is not extended, agencies may be forced to make decisions not to accept rural patients with greater care needs. That could translate into less access to health care for ill, homebound seniors. The result would likely be that these seniors would be hospitalized more frequently and would have to seek care in nursing homes, adding considerable cost to the system.

Failure to extend the rural add-on payment will only put more pressure on rural home health agencies that are already operating on very narrow margins and could force some of the agencies to close their doors altogether. Many home health agencies operating in rural areas are the only home health providers in large geographic areas. If any of these agencies were forced to close, the Medicare patients in that region could lose all of their access to home care.

The legislation we are introducing today will extend the rural add-on for 5 years and help to ensure that Medicare patients in rural areas continue to have access to the home health services they need. I urge all of our colleagues to join us as cosponsors.

Mr. President, I rise today with my colleagues from Arkansas and Missouri to introduce the Medicare Rural Home Health Payment Fairness Act to reinstate the 5 percent add-on payment for home health services in rural areas that expired on January 1, 2007.

Home health has become an increasingly important part of our health care system. The kinds of highly skilled--and often technically complex--services that our Nation's home health caregivers provide have enabled millions of our most frail and vulnerable older and disabled citizens to avoid hospitals and nursing homes and stay just where they want to be--in the comfort and security of their own homes. I have accompanied several of Maine's caring home health nurses on their visits to some of their patients. I have seen first hand the difference that they are making for Maine's elderly.

Surveys have shown that the delivery of home health services in rural areas can be as much as 12 to 15 percent more costly because of the extra travel time required to cover long distances between patients, higher transportation expenses, and other factors. Because of the longer travel times, rural caregivers are unable to make as many visits in a day as their urban counterparts. The executive director of the Visiting Nurses of Aroostook in Northern Maine, where I am from, tells me her agency covers 6,600 square miles with a total population of only 73,000. This agency's costs are understandably much higher than other agencies due to the long distances the staff must drive to see clients. Moreover, the staff is not able to see as many patients due to time on the road.

Agencies in rural areas are also frequently smaller than their urban counterparts, which means that their relative costs are higher. Smaller agencies with fewer patients and fewer visits mean that fixed costs, particularly those associated with meeting regulatory requirements, are spread over a much smaller number of patients and visits, increasing overall per-patient and per-visit costs.

Moreover, in many rural areas, home health agencies are the primary caregivers for homebound beneficiaries with limited access to transportation. These rural patients often require more time and care than their urban counterparts, and are understandably more expensive for agencies to serve. If the extra rural payment is not extended, agencies may be forced to make decisions not to accept rural patients with greater care needs. That could translate into less access to health care for ill, homebound seniors. The result would likely be that these seniors would be hospitalized more frequently and would have to seek care in nursing homes, adding considerable cost to the system.

Failure to extend the rural add-on payment will only put more pressure on rural home health agencies that are already operating on very narrow margins and could force some of the agencies to close their doors altogether. Many home health agencies operating in rural areas are the only home health providers in large geographic areas. If any of these agencies were forced to close, the Medicare patients in that region could lose all of their access to home care.

The legislation we are introducing today will extend the rural add-on for 5 years and help to ensure that Medicare patients in rural areas continue to have access to the home health services they need. I urge all of our colleagues to join us as cosponsors.

Mr. President, the Weapon Systems Acquisition Reform Act of 2009 would strengthen and reform the Department of Defense acquisition processes by bringing increased accountability and transparency to major defense acquisition programs. Simply put, the bill would build discipline into the planning and requirements process, keep projects focused, help prevent cost overruns and schedule delays, and ultimately save taxpayer dollars.

I would like to thank Senators Carl Levin and John McCain, and Representatives Ike Skelton and John McHugh for their work on this important issue and their continued efforts to improve procurement at the Department of Defense. I was proud to join Senators Levin and McCain in co-sponsoring this bill in the Senate.

This legislation would improve DOD's planning and program oversight in many ways. First, the bill would create a new Senate-confirmed Director of Independent Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation to be the ``principal cost estimation official'' at the Department.

The bill also mandates that the Department carefully balance cost, schedule, and performance as part of the requirements development process, building discipline into the procurement process long before a request for proposals is issued or a contract is awarded.

I applaud the ``bright lines'' this legislation would establish regarding organizational conflicts of interest by DOD contractors. These reforms would strengthen the wall between government employees and contractors, helping to ensure that ethical boundaries are respected. While contractors are important partners with military and civilian employees at DOD, their roles and responsibilities must be well defined and free of conflicts of interest as they undertake their critical work supporting our Nation's military.

I appreciate the conferees including an amendment that I offered on the floor with Senator Claire McCaskill regarding earned value management, EVM. EVM provides important visibility into the scope, schedule, and cost of a program in a single integrated system, and when properly applied, EVM

can provide an early warning of performance problems.

GAO has observed that contractor reporting on EVM often lacks consistency, leading to inaccurate data and faulty application of the EVM metric. In other words, garbage in, garbage out.

The conference report would require that the Department of Defense issue an implementation plan for applying EVM consistently and reliably to all projects that use this project management tool.

The implementation plan would also provide enforcement mechanisms to ensure that contractors establish and use approved EVM systems and require DOD to consider the quality of the contractor's EVM systems and reporting in the past performance evaluation for a contract. With improved EVM data quality, both the government and the contractor will be able to improve program oversight, leading to better acquisition outcomes.

The conference report would strengthen the Department's acquisition planning, increase and improve program oversight, and help prevent contracting waste, fraud, and mismanagement. Ultimately, it will help ensure that our military personnel have the equipment they need, when they need it, and that tax dollars are not wasted on programs that were doomed to fail.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside.

Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 1107.

I ask unanimous consent the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the Senator from Connecticut, Mr. Lieberman, be added as a cosponsor of the amendment.

Mr. President, stored value cards have been used and are being used by Mexican drug cartels to smuggle their drug revenues back to Mexico. The Department of Justice estimates that up to $24 billion in cash is smuggled into Mexico each year from the United States and these stored value cards are one of the means by which the cash is smuggled back into Mexico. Stored value cards can be loaded anonymously by individuals who are involved in criminal enterprises, such as drug trafficking. The cards are then physically smuggled across the border and can be used to withdraw large quantities of cash from ATMs.

Under current law, cash and other monetary instruments that exceed $10,000 must be declared at the border. For those of us who have traveled to different countries, we are very familiar with the white form you have to fill out in which you have to indicate if you have cash that exceeds $10,000.

However, there is a loophole in the current law. Stored value cards, either individually or collectively in excess of $10,000, do not have to be reported because they are not considered to be monetary instruments under the law. The amendment Senator Lieberman and I are offering would require such reporting and make it a crime to launder money using these stored value cards.

The Deputy Attorney General of the United States has pointed out that large quantities of cash are put together and smuggled across the border to the south. He has pointed out that there are various ways this can be accomplished but that stored value cards are one of the means for smuggling this cash.

Mr. President, as you know as a loyal and diligent member of the Homeland

Security Committee, our committee has been investigating the problem of drug trafficking from these Mexican cartels. What we found is the drugs are coming north and cash and weapons are going south. By closing the loophole on reporting for large quantities of cash that are being smuggled back and forth using these stored value cards, we can help give law enforcement another tool to crack down on the smuggling of cash that is often the proceeds of criminal activity, including drug smuggling.

This is not just theoretical. It is not only the Deputy Attorney General who has pointed out that these cards can be a means of smuggling large quantities of cash but also law enforcement agents throughout the United States have been investigating criminal enterprises that are using these cards. Let me give a couple of examples.

Law enforcement agents in Dallas have been investigating a Colombian narcotrafficking organization that wanted to launder narcotic proceeds via stored value cards. The organization wanted to obtain 50 stored value cards that would be used to launder $100,000 in proceeds. These transactions would be structured in different increments per card for the total of $100,000. The cards would then be exported out of the United States to Colombia. The cards would be cashed out in Colombia and the dollar value would be converted to Colombian pesos at the official exchange rate.

In another example, law enforcement undercover operations have revealed at least nine transnational criminal groups engaged in moving criminal proceeds via stored value cards. These operations have revealed the cross-border movement of stored value cards loaded with millions of dollars of illicit proceeds. Numerous collateral investigations and enforcement actions have been conducted as a result of these undercover activities.

This is a loophole in our laws we need to plug and the Collins- Lieberman amendment would do that. It would treat these cards as the equivalent of cash because that is what they are. That is what they are. It would require that, just as if you crossed the border with $10,000 in cash or other monetary instruments you have to declare it, so would you have to declare it if you have these stored value cards. In addition, it would make a failure to report the amount of money on these cards, if it is $10,000 or more, as a crime, and it would also make it a crime to launder money using these cards.

This is a very concrete, needed action that we could take to help crack down on the smuggling of money that fuels the drug trafficking across the Mexican border. It is a very practical step we can take right now to close a loophole in the law and to provide law enforcement with a much-needed tool.

I know the managers of the bill are not on the floor at present so I will withhold asking for a vote on this amendment. I do believe we are in the process of clearing it on both sides, but I am uncertain whether that has been completed. It may be that the acting manager of the bill can inform me.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from Illinois, the Presiding Officer, be added as a cosponsor of the amendment, and I thank him very much for his support.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I am pleased to join Senator Carper in introducing a bill that would provide reasonable job protections for our Nation's volunteer firefighters and emergency medical personnel who save thousands of lives across this country every year.

This bill is a matter of simple fairness. It recognizes that volunteer firefighters and emergency medical personnel not only serve their own towns and offer mutual assistance to other communities on a day-to-day basis, but also that they are a key component in State and Federal plans for responding to catastrophic natural disasters and terrorist attacks.

Across the Nation, our emergency planning relies on the ready availability of these brave first responders. Indeed, volunteers are absolutely critical to mounting a response to disasters, both large and small. My home State of Maine, for example, has slightly more than 10,000 firefighters in 492 departments. Because Maine is a mostly rural State, fully 88 percent of those firefighters are volunteers.

Yet, even if they are called up in a major disaster or a Presidentially declared emergency under the Stafford Act, these volunteers have no official protection for their jobs while they are answering the call to duty.

We should protect volunteer firefighters and EMS personnel who put their lives on the line.

The current lack of job protection is troubling. If large numbers of volunteer firefighters and EMS personnel were terminated or demoted after being called away to a disaster or a series of disasters, recruitment and retention of volunteers could be devastated.

The Volunteer Firefighter and EMS Personnel Job Protection Act would correct the injustice and mitigate the danger in a measured and responsible way. It would protect the volunteer first responders against termination or demotion by employers if they are called upon to respond to a Presidentially declared emergency or a major disaster for up to 14 work days.

Most employers are strong supporters of our volunteer firefighters and EMS personnel, and this bill imposes no unreasonable burdens on employers. They are not obligated to pay the volunteers during their absence, and they are entitled to receive official documentation that an absent employee was in fact summoned to and served in a disaster response.

Finally, I would note that the bill would facilitate the work of emergency managers. Having this job protection in force would allow them to make operational and contingency plans with greater confidence, knowing that volunteer responders would not be forced to withdraw in short order for fear of losing their jobs.

By extending some peace of mind to these brave men and women, we can strengthen the protection and lifesaving response that they provide to many millions of Americans. I believe this bill merits the support of every Senator, and I am proud to be an original cosponsor.

Mr. President, I am pleased to join Senator Carper in introducing a bill that would provide reasonable job protections for our Nation's volunteer firefighters and emergency medical personnel who save thousands of lives across this country every year.

This bill is a matter of simple fairness. It recognizes that volunteer firefighters and emergency medical personnel not only serve their own towns and offer mutual assistance to other communities on a day-to-day basis, but also that they are a key component in State and Federal plans for responding to catastrophic natural disasters and terrorist attacks.

Across the Nation, our emergency planning relies on the ready availability of these brave first responders. Indeed, volunteers are absolutely critical to mounting a response to disasters, both large and small. My home State of Maine, for example, has slightly more than 10,000 firefighters in 492 departments. Because Maine is a mostly rural State, fully 88 percent of those firefighters are volunteers.

Yet, even if they are called up in a major disaster or a Presidentially declared emergency under the Stafford Act, these volunteers have no official protection for their jobs while they are answering the call to duty.

We should protect volunteer firefighters and EMS personnel who put their lives on the line.

The current lack of job protection is troubling. If large numbers of volunteer firefighters and EMS personnel were terminated or demoted after being called away to a disaster or a series of disasters, recruitment and retention of volunteers could be devastated.

The Volunteer Firefighter and EMS Personnel Job Protection Act would correct the injustice and mitigate the danger in a measured and responsible way. It would protect the volunteer first responders against termination or demotion by employers if they are called upon to respond to a Presidentially declared emergency or a major disaster for up to 14 work days.

Most employers are strong supporters of our volunteer firefighters and EMS personnel, and this bill imposes no unreasonable burdens on employers. They are not obligated to pay the volunteers during their absence, and they are entitled to receive official documentation that an absent employee was in fact summoned to and served in a disaster response.

Finally, I would note that the bill would facilitate the work of emergency managers. Having this job protection in force would allow them to make operational and contingency plans with greater confidence, knowing that volunteer responders would not be forced to withdraw in short order for fear of losing their jobs.

By extending some peace of mind to these brave men and women, we can strengthen the protection and lifesaving response that they provide to many millions of Americans. I believe this bill merits the support of every Senator, and I am proud to be an original cosponsor.

Mr. President, would the Senator yield for a question?

Some have expressed concerns that changes proposed by this bill could cause Nunn-McCurdy breaches even when a program is performing well and when the Department has provided well-defined requirements. In particular these experts have pointed to the potential for unit cost breaches that could be caused by policy decisions to reduce the number of units that would be purchased by the program. These policy decisions could originate in the executive branch or Congress and could be made regardless of past program performance. Do you believe this legislation will have that effect, and, if so, was that your intention?

Mr. Levin. I thank the Senator for her inquiry. This legislation would not change the existing Nunn-McCurdy thresholds for unit cost breaches. I do not believe that programs that are performing well have breached Nunn-McCurdy thresholds in the past as a result of changes in the quantity of units procured under a program, and I do not consider it likely in the future. In the case of a program that is not performing well, a change in unit quantities may be sufficient to push a program over the thresholds. This is a factor that the Department may consider in deciding whether and how to continue with the program. For programs performing well, however, the likelihood of a breach is extremely small. Nonetheless, it is certainly not our intention to penalize programs performing well, and I look forward to continuing to work with the Senator as this bill proceeds through Congress to address these concerns.

NIP-Funded Acquisition Programs

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, the Weapon Systems Acquisition Reform Act of 2009, authored by Senators Levin and McCain, would strengthen and reform the Department of Defense acquisition process.

The bill would bring increased accountability, more transparency, and cost savings to major defense acquisition programs. Simply put, the bill would build discipline into the planning and requirements process, keep projects focused, help to prevent cost overruns and schedule delays and ultimately save taxpayers' dollars.

I am very proud to join the chairman and ranking member of the Armed Services Committee in cosponsoring this important initiative. I applaud their continued efforts to improve procurement at the Pentagon.

In fiscal year 2008, DOD spending reached $396 billion, approximately 74 percent of total Federal contract spending. The scope of the Department's contract spending is particularly startling when one examines closely Army procurement. The number of Army contract actions has grown by more than 600 percent since 2001, and contract dollars have increased by more than 500 percent.

In 2007, the Army put on contract one out of every four Federal contracting dollars. These figures alone are overwhelming. But they actually understate the scope of the procurement challenges at the Department of Defense.

Research, development, testing, evaluation, and procurement of increasingly complex weapon systems challenge the Department's ability to ensure that taxpayer dollars are wisely spent. Let me give you an example: The National Polar Orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System--there is a mouthful--is just one of several Defense programs that have been undermined by cost overruns and schedule delays.

This is a complicated program that is required to promote and provide a remote sensing capability that is used by the Department of Defense and by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

A 2006 report by an inspector general indicated that this one program was more than $3 billion over the initial life cycle cost estimates and nearly 17 months behind schedule. So here we have an essential program that is $3 billion over the initial life cycle cost estimates and it is about a year and a half behind schedule. Unfortunately, this is not an isolated example. It is but one of many examples of defense procurements that have suffered from soaring cost increases and unacceptable delays.

The legislation introduced by Senators Levin and McCain, which I am pleased to cosponsor, would improve the Defense Department's planning and program oversight in many ways.

First, the bill would create a new director of independent cost assessment to be the principal cost estimation official at the Department. The director would be responsible for monitoring and reviewing all cost estimates and cost analyses conducted in connection with the major defense acquisition programs. Having this set of independent eyes on critical but expensive programs would help to prevent wasteful spending. It would help to ensure that when we embark on a new defense acquisition, we truly have confidence in the cost estimates.

The bill also mandates that the Department carefully balance cost, schedule, and performance as part of the requirements development process. These reforms would build important discipline into the procurement process long before a request for proposals is issued and a contract is awarded. By carefully considering the needs of the program office, the associated requirements and estimated cost of a program, and the risks inherent in system development and deployment, the Department will be able to make much more rational decisions about its investments and use more effective contracting vehicles for procurements long before taxpayer dollars are committed to the project.

I also applaud the bright lines this legislation would establish regarding organizational conflicts of interest by defense contractors. These reforms would strengthen the wall between Government employees and contractors, helping to ensure that ethical boundaries are respected. While certainly private sector contractors are vital partners with military and civilian employees at the Department of Defense, their roles and responsibilities must be well defined and free of conflicts of interest as they undertake their critical work supporting our Nation's military.

What we are finding--and we have had oversight hearings in the Homeland Security Committee on this issue--is that in the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Defense, in some cases we have defense contractors involved in setting requirements, defining requirements for projects on which subsidiaries of those defense contractors may well be bidding. We want to avoid those kinds of conflicts of interest which impair confidence in the integrity of the process.

We also want to make sure we are following current law as far as activities that should be done in-house because they are inherently governmental.

I note, too, that this legislation encourages the Department to reinvest personnel resources in systems engineers--a necessary element for any successful acquisition reform of the Department's major weapon systems programs. Without experienced, well-trained engineers, the Department will be unable to set definitive requirements during the planning process, incapable of effectively testing and evaluating the development of these systems, and ineffective in addressing systems defects in the incredibly complex programs in which the Department, of necessity, invests. The lack of systems engineers also prevents strong program oversight, as the limited number of engineers available simply cannot focus sufficient time and attention on the programs as they are constantly pulled in multiple directions.

Adding systems engineers is only one part of the overall personnel reforms necessary to improve the acquisition process. DOD must also invest significantly in its undermanned acquisition workforce.

The dramatic downsizing of the defense acquisition workforce during the 1990s was followed by an even more dramatic increase in workload. So at the time that the Defense Department's acquisition workforce was declining, the workload was increasing. In fiscal year 2001, the Department spent $138 billion on contracts. Seven years later, DOD

spending reached $396 billion--a 187-percent increase. Of that amount, $202 billion was for the procurement of services. That requires labor- intensive acquisition management and oversight. Needless to say, these factors have greatly strained the defense acquisition workforce and greatly increased the risk of acquisition failure. At the same time, a significant increase in the use of contractor acquisition support personnel has added another layer of complexity as the Department must manage both organizational and personal conflicts of interest.

I commend Secretary Gates for recognizing just how important these workforce issues are. Under his leadership, the Department has set forth an aggressive program for strengthening the acquisition workforce, including increasing the number of acquisition personnel and improving their training. The Secretary has proposed increasing the workforce by 15 percent through 2015. That amounts to approximately 20,000 new employees. I also praise the Secretary for not only adding additional personnel but for thinking about what they should be doing. For example, he has proposed that some of these new employees take over tasks that are currently being performed by defense contractors. That is that conflict-of-interest issue I mentioned earlier. If the Secretary's plan goes through--and I am going to support him strongly in this regard--the acquisition workforce would increase to numbers not seen in a decade. That will save money and improve acquisition outcomes.

But this isn't just a numbers game. In addition to having a sufficient number of personnel, the Department must have the right mix. I am pleased that the Secretary has proposed 600 additional auditors for DCAA, the Defense Contract Audit Agency, and additional engineers and technical experts.

These acquisition changes will help to prevent contracting waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement. Most of all, they are absolutely essential to the effective implementation of the procurement reforms in this bill. We can write the best laws. We can impose the strongest reforms. But if we do not have sufficient personnel, well-trained employees to carry out these reforms, our efforts will be for naught.

I now call up an amendment I have at the desk. It is amendment No. 1045.

I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. President, this amendment, which I am offering along with my distinguished colleague, Senator McCaskill, who has brought great auditing skills to this body, would help to ensure that the Department is supplying certain critical principles consistently and reliably to all projects that use a specific management tool that is known as EVM, earned value management. The Department currently requires EVM tracking for all contracts that exceed $20 million. This provides important visibility into the scope, schedule, and cost in a single integrated system. When properly applied, this system can provide an early warning of performance problems. The Government Accountability Office has observed, however, that contractor reporting on EVM often lacks consistency, leading to inaccurate data and faulty application of this metric. In other words, this is a garbage-in/ garbage-out problem that we need to correct.

To address this challenge, our amendment would provide enforcement mechanisms to ensure that contractors establish and use approved EVM systems, and we would require the Department of Defense to consider the quality of the contractor's EVM systems and reporting in the past performance evaluation for a contract. When a contractor is bidding, the contracting official looks at any past performance. With improved data quality, both the Government and the contractor will be able to improve program oversight, leading to better acquisition outcomes.

This is so important. Some of the provisions that are particularly important in the Levin-McCain bill would increase transparency and oversight so that if an acquisition process is going in the wrong direction, we know about it and are able to take action. We are able to decide whether the Nunn-McCurdy breaches, for example, warrant halting the project. We are improving the cost estimate system for weapons acquisition projects. We have a lot of reforms. This would increase our transparency, our ability to flag problems.

I believe this amendment Senator McCaskill and I offer would help to strengthen the Department's acquisition planning, increase and improve program oversight, and help to prevent contracting waste, fraud, and mismanagement.

Let me end my comments by reminding all of us why this bill and our amendment are so important.

Ultimately, these procurement reforms will help ensure that our brave men and women in uniform--our military personnel--have the equipment they need when they need it, that it performs as promised, and that our tax dollars are not wasted on programs that are doomed to fail.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Mr. President, I thank the chairman for his thoughtful comments and for working with us on this amendment. I hope at the appropriate time it can be adopted. I believe it is acceptable to Senator McCain. But I am unclear whether there is further clearance that needs to be done.

But, again, while the Senator is on the floor, I want to once again praise Senator Levin and Senator McCain for tackling this critical issue. It is complex. And it is important that the reforms make a difference to our military--to those who need these weapon systems, who need the material and the supplies that the contracting is procuring. It is also important that taxpayers be protected. There have been far too many cost overruns and schedule delays that hurt those who are on the front lines, quite literally.

I praise and thank the chairman again for his leadership in this area.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I am informed that the amendment I have offered with Senator McCaskill, which is the pending amendment, No. 1045, has been cleared on our side.

I move to lay that motion on the table.

The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Thank you, Mr. President. And I thank the chairman.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Eric Cho, a detailee on my Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs staff, be granted the privileges of the floor during the duration of the debate on this legislation S. 454.

Mr. President. I am pleased to join Senator Carper in reintroducing a bill that will improve agency performance and Congressional oversight of major federal information-technology, IT, projects. We introduced this bill last Congress and offer it for consideration again because it will strengthen oversight of technology investments to help prevent the waste and misuse of taxpayer dollars.

The well-publicized cost and performance problems with the Census Bureau's handheld computers for the 2010 Census--with its troubling implications for the next House reapportionment and for the allocation of Federal funds--represent only the most recent and conspicuous failure in a long trail of troubles that also includes critical IT projects like the FBI's Virtual Case File initiative.

The 2010 Census is notable among projects that have drawn our attention, not only because of its great scope and expense, but because of its history of unheeded cautions. For years, warnings of potential dangers came from experts sought out by the Census Bureau itself and from the Commerce Department's own Inspector General.

The implications of this lack of proper planning and oversight are evident in the burgeoning estimate for the life-cycle cost of the 2010 Census. The Bureau initially estimated that the 2010 Census would cost the taxpayers about $11.3 billion dollars; today, the estimated cost is more than $14 billion.

Another example is the Department of Homeland Security's, DHS, efforts since 2004 to integrate its financial management systems. DHS spent approximately $52 million on one failed attempt before abandoning the project nearly two years later. According to GAO, this attempt likely failed because DHS had not developed an overall financial management transformation strategy that included financial management policies and procedures, standard business processes, a human capital strategy, and effective internal controls. DHS spent approximately $52 million and now has little, if anything, to show for it.

The Department of Homeland Security is now attempting another consolidation of its financial information technology systems. It is essential that, this time, the Department sufficiently plan and monitor its cost, schedule, and performance targets.

During the 108th Congress, the Committee on Governmental Affairs investigated the botched automated record-keeping project for the federal employees' Thrift Savings Plan, TSP. This project was terminated in 2001 after a four-year contract produced $36 million in waste that was charged to the accounts of TSP participants and beneficiaries. A second vendor needed an additional $33 million to bring the system online, years overdue and costing more than double its original estimate.

In a 2004 letter from the Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board to the Governmental Affairs Committee, the Board characterized the project as ``ill-fated,'' and acknowledged the importance of careful planning, task definition, communication, proper personnel, and risk management--all of which were lacking on that project.

Large IT project failures have cost US taxpayers literally billions of dollars in wasted expenditures. Perhaps even more troubling is the fact that when Federal IT projects fail, they can undermine the government's ability to defend the nation, enforce its laws, or deliver critical services to citizens. Again and again, we have seen IT project failures grounded in poor planning, ill-defined and shifting requirements, undisclosed difficulties, poor risk management, and lax monitoring of performance.

Unfortunately, as the Government Accountability Office, GAO, continues to report, Federal IT projects still fall short in their use of effective oversight techniques to monitor development and to spot signs of possible trouble.

The GAO reported that the Federal Government spent over $71 billion in fiscal year 2009 on IT projects. Most of that spending was concentrated in two dozen agencies that have approximately 800 major projects underway.

When the GAO reviewed a random sampling of these major Federal IT projects, they found that 85--nearly half the sample--had been ``rebaselined.'' Eighteen of those projects have been rebaselined three or more times. For example, the Department of Defense Advanced Field Artillery Tactical Data System has been rebaselined four times; a Veterans Affairs Health Administration Center project has been rebaselined 6 times.

Rebaselining can reflect funding changes, revisions in project scope or goals, and other perfectly reasonable project modifications. But as the GAO notes, ``[rebaselining] can also be used to mask cost overruns and schedule delays.'' All major federal agencies have rebaselining policies, but the GAO concludes that they are not comprehensive and that ``none of the policies are fully consistent with best practices.''

The bill that Senator Carper and I are introducing will go far toward addressing the weaknesses identified by the GAO and will reduce the risks that important Federal IT projects will drag on far beyond deadlines, fail to deliver intended capabilities, or waste taxpayers' money.

Our bill will improve both agency and Congressional oversight of large Federal IT projects. For all major investments, the bill requires agencies to track the Earned Value Management index, a key cost and performance measure, and to alert Congress should that measure fall below a defined threshold.

The bill requires additional reports to Congress as well as specific corrective actions should those same indicators continue to worsen. Further, because the bill's performance thresholds are based on original cost baselines, rebaselining can no longer serve as a tactic to hide troubled projects. Where severe shortfalls remain uncorrected, agencies are prohibited from committing additional funds to the project until the required corrective actions are taken.

Our bill would not make Congress a micro-manager of Federal projects--especially in so complex a field as information technology. But it will ensure that, for these important investments, agencies will be required to track key performance metrics, inform Congress of shortfalls in those metrics, and provide Congress with follow-up reports, independent cost estimates, and analyses of project alternatives when the original projects have run off course.

The bill also provides that each covered agency identify to Congress their top mission-critical projects. Those ``core investments'' would be subject to additional upfront planning, reporting, and performance monitoring requirements. This will help ensure that agencies apply extra vigilance to these projects at the planning stage, and not just when execution begins.

In addition to tracking cost and schedule slippage, agencies making

core IT investments must provide a complete ``business case'' that outlines the need for the project and its associated costs and schedules; produce a rigorous, independent, third-party estimate of the project's full, life-cycle costs; have the agency CIO certify the project's functional requirements; track these functional requirements; and report to Congress any changes in functional requirements, including whether those changes concealed a major cost increase.

To help agencies deliver IT projects on time and on budget, the bill also provides two new support mechanisms.

First, agency heads would be required to establish an internal IT- management program, subject to OMB guidelines, to improve project planning, requirements development, and management of earned value and risk.

Second, the Director of OMB and its E-Gov Administrator would be required to establish an IT Tiger Team of experts and independent consultants that can be assigned to help agencies reform troubled projects. In addition, the E-Gov Administrator can recommend that agency heads mentor or replace an IT project manager, reinforce the management team, terminate the project, or hire an independent contractor to report on the project.

These and other provisions will help improve project planning, avoid problems in project execution, provide early alerts when problems arise, and promote prompt corrective action.

In projects where difficulties persist, our bill provides strong remedies. For projects that exhibit a performance shortfall of 20 percent or more, the agency head involved must not only alert Congress but also provide a summary of a concrete plan of action to correct the problem. If the shortfall exceeds 40 percent, agencies have six months to take required remedial steps or else suspend further project spending until those steps are completed.

If the provisions of this bill had been in force during the past decade, early indicators of trouble and prompt warnings to Congress might have helped prevent much of the added cost, decreased functionality, and increased anxiety we now see surrounding the handheld computers that were intended to streamline the 2010 Census. The additional scrutiny of plans and costs required by this bill might have saved some of the billions wasted on other IT projects that ultimately landed on high-risk lists.

I urge every Senator to support this much-needed and bipartisan bill.

Mr. President. I am pleased to join Senator Carper in reintroducing a bill that will improve agency performance and Congressional oversight of major federal information-technology, IT, projects. We introduced this bill last Congress and offer it for consideration again because it will strengthen oversight of technology investments to help prevent the waste and misuse of taxpayer dollars.

The well-publicized cost and performance problems with the Census Bureau's handheld computers for the 2010 Census--with its troubling implications for the next House reapportionment and for the allocation of Federal funds--represent only the most recent and conspicuous failure in a long trail of troubles that also includes critical IT projects like the FBI's Virtual Case File initiative.

The 2010 Census is notable among projects that have drawn our attention, not only because of its great scope and expense, but because of its history of unheeded cautions. For years, warnings of potential dangers came from experts sought out by the Census Bureau itself and from the Commerce Department's own Inspector General.

The implications of this lack of proper planning and oversight are evident in the burgeoning estimate for the life-cycle cost of the 2010 Census. The Bureau initially estimated that the 2010 Census would cost the taxpayers about $11.3 billion dollars; today, the estimated cost is more than $14 billion.

Another example is the Department of Homeland Security's, DHS, efforts since 2004 to integrate its financial management systems. DHS spent approximately $52 million on one failed attempt before abandoning the project nearly two years later. According to GAO, this attempt likely failed because DHS had not developed an overall financial management transformation strategy that included financial management policies and procedures, standard business processes, a human capital strategy, and effective internal controls. DHS spent approximately $52 million and now has little, if anything, to show for it.

The Department of Homeland Security is now attempting another consolidation of its financial information technology systems. It is essential that, this time, the Department sufficiently plan and monitor its cost, schedule, and performance targets.

During the 108th Congress, the Committee on Governmental Affairs investigated the botched automated record-keeping project for the federal employees' Thrift Savings Plan, TSP. This project was terminated in 2001 after a four-year contract produced $36 million in waste that was charged to the accounts of TSP participants and beneficiaries. A second vendor needed an additional $33 million to bring the system online, years overdue and costing more than double its original estimate.

In a 2004 letter from the Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board to the Governmental Affairs Committee, the Board characterized the project as ``ill-fated,'' and acknowledged the importance of careful planning, task definition, communication, proper personnel, and risk management--all of which were lacking on that project.

Large IT project failures have cost US taxpayers literally billions of dollars in wasted expenditures. Perhaps even more troubling is the fact that when Federal IT projects fail, they can undermine the government's ability to defend the nation, enforce its laws, or deliver critical services to citizens. Again and again, we have seen IT project failures grounded in poor planning, ill-defined and shifting requirements, undisclosed difficulties, poor risk management, and lax monitoring of performance.

Unfortunately, as the Government Accountability Office, GAO, continues to report, Federal IT projects still fall short in their use of effective oversight techniques to monitor development and to spot signs of possible trouble.

The GAO reported that the Federal Government spent over $71 billion in fiscal year 2009 on IT projects. Most of that spending was concentrated in two dozen agencies that have approximately 800 major projects underway.

When the GAO reviewed a random sampling of these major Federal IT projects, they found that 85--nearly half the sample--had been ``rebaselined.'' Eighteen of those projects have been rebaselined three or more times. For example, the Department of Defense Advanced Field Artillery Tactical Data System has been rebaselined four times; a Veterans Affairs Health Administration Center project has been rebaselined 6 times.

Rebaselining can reflect funding changes, revisions in project scope or goals, and other perfectly reasonable project modifications. But as the GAO notes, ``[rebaselining] can also be used to mask cost overruns and schedule delays.'' All major federal agencies have rebaselining policies, but the GAO concludes that they are not comprehensive and that ``none of the policies are fully consistent with best practices.''

The bill that Senator Carper and I are introducing will go far toward addressing the weaknesses identified by the GAO and will reduce the risks that important Federal IT projects will drag on far beyond deadlines, fail to deliver intended capabilities, or waste taxpayers' money.

Our bill will improve both agency and Congressional oversight of large Federal IT projects. For all major investments, the bill requires agencies to track the Earned Value Management index, a key cost and performance measure, and to alert Congress should that measure fall below a defined threshold.

The bill requires additional reports to Congress as well as specific corrective actions should those same indicators continue to worsen. Further, because the bill's performance thresholds are based on original cost baselines, rebaselining can no longer serve as a tactic to hide troubled projects. Where severe shortfalls remain uncorrected, agencies are prohibited from committing additional funds to the project until the required corrective actions are taken.

Our bill would not make Congress a micro-manager of Federal projects--especially in so complex a field as information technology. But it will ensure that, for these important investments, agencies will be required to track key performance metrics, inform Congress of shortfalls in those metrics, and provide Congress with follow-up reports, independent cost estimates, and analyses of project alternatives when the original projects have run off course.

The bill also provides that each covered agency identify to Congress their top mission-critical projects. Those ``core investments'' would be subject to additional upfront planning, reporting, and performance monitoring requirements. This will help ensure that agencies apply extra vigilance to these projects at the planning stage, and not just when execution begins.

In addition to tracking cost and schedule slippage, agencies making

core IT investments must provide a complete ``business case'' that outlines the need for the project and its associated costs and schedules; produce a rigorous, independent, third-party estimate of the project's full, life-cycle costs; have the agency CIO certify the project's functional requirements; track these functional requirements; and report to Congress any changes in functional requirements, including whether those changes concealed a major cost increase.

To help agencies deliver IT projects on time and on budget, the bill also provides two new support mechanisms.

First, agency heads would be required to establish an internal IT- management program, subject to OMB guidelines, to improve project planning, requirements development, and management of earned value and risk.

Second, the Director of OMB and its E-Gov Administrator would be required to establish an IT Tiger Team of experts and independent consultants that can be assigned to help agencies reform troubled projects. In addition, the E-Gov Administrator can recommend that agency heads mentor or replace an IT project manager, reinforce the management team, terminate the project, or hire an independent contractor to report on the project.

These and other provisions will help improve project planning, avoid problems in project execution, provide early alerts when problems arise, and promote prompt corrective action.

In projects where difficulties persist, our bill provides strong remedies. For projects that exhibit a performance shortfall of 20 percent or more, the agency head involved must not only alert Congress but also provide a summary of a concrete plan of action to correct the problem. If the shortfall exceeds 40 percent, agencies have six months to take required remedial steps or else suspend further project spending until those steps are completed.

If the provisions of this bill had been in force during the past decade, early indicators of trouble and prompt warnings to Congress might have helped prevent much of the added cost, decreased functionality, and increased anxiety we now see surrounding the handheld computers that were intended to streamline the 2010 Census. The additional scrutiny of plans and costs required by this bill might have saved some of the billions wasted on other IT projects that ultimately landed on high-risk lists.

I urge every Senator to support this much-needed and bipartisan bill.

Madam President, I rise today to recognize April as the 21st Annual National American City Quality Month. Led by the National League of Cities, the U.S. Conference of Mayors, and the American City Planning Directors' Council/American City Quality Foundation, this valuable program brings together a wide range of public and private partners. Their efforts demonstrate what it takes to build great communities, addressing vital issues to include land use, building design, transportation, parks and recreation, energy efficiency, and environmental protection.

City planners across my State of Maine and throughout the Nation are calling on public and private sector leaders to commit to efforts that will lead to better planning, redevelopment and development of our Nation's cities and surrounding regions. This is essential to accommodate U.S. Census projected population growth of 34.5 million by the year 2020 and 100 million within 20 to 30 years.

This public-private partnership is necessary to meet the growing need for higher quality, more energy efficient and sustainable housing, buildings, public transportation, infrastructure, agriculture, and industry. I applaud these collaborative efforts to improve urban and rural communities across our Nation.

This collaborative planning works. Just a few weeks ago, Forbes magazine named Portland, ME, my State's largest city, as the most livable city in America. In addition, Portland's busy Commercial Street was voted as one of the country's great streets by the American Planning Association. The transformation of Portland did not happen by accident. It is the result of citizens and organizations working together. And American City Quality Month celebrates this effort.

Mr. President, the recent terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India, are a sobering reminder that terrorists continue to threaten our Nation and civilized people throughout the world. An alert citizenry is our first line of defense against terrorist attacks, particularly attacks like those in Mumbai. Our laws must protect individuals from frivolous lawsuits when they report, in good faith, suspicious behavior that may indicate terrorist activity. That is why I am introducing legislation, with Senator Lieberman, that will provide these important protections.

In the 2007 homeland security law, Chairman Lieberman and I coauthored a provision to encourage people to report potential terrorist threats directed against transportation systems. This new legislation would expand those protections to reports of suspicious behavior in sectors other than transportation. For example, reports of suspicious activity could be equally important in detecting terrorist plans to attack ``soft targets'' like the hotels, restaurants, and religious institutions targeted in Mumbai.

Real life examples highlight the need for this bill. In December 2008, a Federal jury convicted 5 men from New Jersey of conspiring to murder American soldiers at Fort Dix. According to law enforcement officials, the report of an alert store clerk, who reported that a customer had brought in a video showing men firing weapons and shouting in Arabic, triggered their investigation. But for the report of this vigilant store clerk, law enforcement may not have disrupted this plot against Fort Dix.

That store clerk's action likely saved hundreds of lives. It also reveals a core truth of the dangerous times in which we live. Our safety depends on more than just police officers, intelligence analysts, and soldiers. It also depends on the alertness and civic responsibility of all Americans.

We must encourage citizens to be watchful and to report suspicious activity whenever it occurs. That imperative is even stronger in the aftermath of the November 2008 terrorist attacks in Mumbai, where it appears that the terrorists performed reconnaissance on a number of the targets before the actual attacks.

Senator Lieberman and I recently convened two hearings in the Homeland Security Committee to examine lessons learned from those horrific attacks. These hearings have reinforced our long-standing concern that terrorists might shift their attention from high-value, high-security targets to less secure commercial facilities, where there is the potential for mass casualties and widespread panic. As we witnessed during the three-day siege of Mumbai, commercial facilities or ``soft

targets,'' such as the Taj Mahal, Trident, and Oberoi Hotels, are vulnerable, tempting targets.

Many of the Committee's witnesses during these hearings, including Charles Allen, DHS's Chief Intelligence Officer, Donald Van Duyn, the FBI's Chief Intelligence Officer, New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelley, and Al Orlob, Marriott International's Vice President for Corporate Security, endorsed the idea of expanding the 2007 law beyond the transportation sector. Indeed, Commissioner Kelley said that the 2007 law ``made eminently good sense'' and recommended ``that it be expanded [to other sectors] if at all possible.''

Unfortunately, we have seen that our legal system can be used to chill the willingness of citizens to come forward and report possible dangers. As widely reported by the media in 2006, US Airways removed 6 Islamic clerics from a flight after other passengers expressed concerns that some of the clerics had moved out of the their assigned seats and had requested, but were not using, seat belt extenders that could possibly double as weapons. In response to these concerns, US Airways officials removed these individuals from the plane so that they could further investigate.

For voicing their reasonable fears that these passengers could be rehearsing or preparing to execute a hijacking, these honestly concerned travelers found themselves as defendants in a civil rights lawsuit and accused of bigotry. The old adage about how ``no good deed goes unpunished'' is quite apt here.

The existence of this lawsuit clearly illustrates how unfair it is to allow private citizens to be intimidated into silence by the threat of litigation. Would the passengers have spoken up if they had anticipated that there would be a lawsuit filed against them? Even if such suits fail, they can expose citizens to heavy costs in time and legal fees.

The bill we introduce today would provide civil immunity in American courts for any person acting in good faith who reports any suspicious transaction, activity, or occurrence related to an act of terrorism. Specifically, the bill would encourage people to pass on information to Federal officials with responsibility for preventing, protecting against, disrupting, or responding to a terrorist act or to Federal, State, and local law enforcement officials without fear of being sued for doing their civic duty. Only disclosures made to those responsible officials would be protected by the legislation.

Once a report is received, those officials would be responsible for assessing its reasonableness and determining whether further action is required. If they take reasonable action to mitigate the reported threat, they, too, would be protected from lawsuits. Just as we should not discourage reporting suspicious incidents, we also should not discourage reasonable responses to them.

Let me make very clear that this bill does not offer any protection whatsoever if an individual makes a statement that he or she knows to be false. No one will be able to use this protection as cover for mischievous, vengeful, or biased falsehoods.

Our laws and legal system must not be hijacked to intimidate people into silence or to prevent our officials from responding to terrorist threats. Protecting citizens who make good faith reports--and that's an important condition in this bill--of potentially lethal activities is essential to maintaining our homeland security. Our bill offers protection in a measured way that discourages abuses from either side.

Each of us has an important responsibility in the fight against terrorism. It is not a fight that can be left to law enforcement alone. The police simply can't be everywhere. Whether at a hotel, a mall, or an arena, homeland security and law enforcement officials need all citizens to alert them to unattended packages and behavior that appears out of the ordinary.

Many national organizations, such as the Fraternal Order of Police, the National Sheriffs' Association, the National Troopers Coalition, and the National Association of Town Watch, support this legislation.

If someone ``sees something'' suspicious, Congress has an obligation to ensure that he or she will ``say something'' about it. This bill promotes and protects that civic duty. I urge my colleagues to support it.

Mr. President, the recent terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India, are a sobering reminder that terrorists continue to threaten our Nation and civilized people throughout the world. An alert citizenry is our first line of defense against terrorist attacks, particularly attacks like those in Mumbai. Our laws must protect individuals from frivolous lawsuits when they report, in good faith, suspicious behavior that may indicate terrorist activity. That is why I am introducing legislation, with Senator Lieberman, that will provide these important protections.

In the 2007 homeland security law, Chairman Lieberman and I coauthored a provision to encourage people to report potential terrorist threats directed against transportation systems. This new legislation would expand those protections to reports of suspicious behavior in sectors other than transportation. For example, reports of suspicious activity could be equally important in detecting terrorist plans to attack ``soft targets'' like the hotels, restaurants, and religious institutions targeted in Mumbai.

Real life examples highlight the need for this bill. In December 2008, a Federal jury convicted 5 men from New Jersey of conspiring to murder American soldiers at Fort Dix. According to law enforcement officials, the report of an alert store clerk, who reported that a customer had brought in a video showing men firing weapons and shouting in Arabic, triggered their investigation. But for the report of this vigilant store clerk, law enforcement may not have disrupted this plot against Fort Dix.

That store clerk's action likely saved hundreds of lives. It also reveals a core truth of the dangerous times in which we live. Our safety depends on more than just police officers, intelligence analysts, and soldiers. It also depends on the alertness and civic responsibility of all Americans.

We must encourage citizens to be watchful and to report suspicious activity whenever it occurs. That imperative is even stronger in the aftermath of the November 2008 terrorist attacks in Mumbai, where it appears that the terrorists performed reconnaissance on a number of the targets before the actual attacks.

Senator Lieberman and I recently convened two hearings in the Homeland Security Committee to examine lessons learned from those horrific attacks. These hearings have reinforced our long-standing concern that terrorists might shift their attention from high-value, high-security targets to less secure commercial facilities, where there is the potential for mass casualties and widespread panic. As we witnessed during the three-day siege of Mumbai, commercial facilities or ``soft

targets,'' such as the Taj Mahal, Trident, and Oberoi Hotels, are vulnerable, tempting targets.

Many of the Committee's witnesses during these hearings, including Charles Allen, DHS's Chief Intelligence Officer, Donald Van Duyn, the FBI's Chief Intelligence Officer, New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelley, and Al Orlob, Marriott International's Vice President for Corporate Security, endorsed the idea of expanding the 2007 law beyond the transportation sector. Indeed, Commissioner Kelley said that the 2007 law ``made eminently good sense'' and recommended ``that it be expanded [to other sectors] if at all possible.''

Unfortunately, we have seen that our legal system can be used to chill the willingness of citizens to come forward and report possible dangers. As widely reported by the media in 2006, US Airways removed 6 Islamic clerics from a flight after other passengers expressed concerns that some of the clerics had moved out of the their assigned seats and had requested, but were not using, seat belt extenders that could possibly double as weapons. In response to these concerns, US Airways officials removed these individuals from the plane so that they could further investigate.

For voicing their reasonable fears that these passengers could be rehearsing or preparing to execute a hijacking, these honestly concerned travelers found themselves as defendants in a civil rights lawsuit and accused of bigotry. The old adage about how ``no good deed goes unpunished'' is quite apt here.

The existence of this lawsuit clearly illustrates how unfair it is to allow private citizens to be intimidated into silence by the threat of litigation. Would the passengers have spoken up if they had anticipated that there would be a lawsuit filed against them? Even if such suits fail, they can expose citizens to heavy costs in time and legal fees.

The bill we introduce today would provide civil immunity in American courts for any person acting in good faith who reports any suspicious transaction, activity, or occurrence related to an act of terrorism. Specifically, the bill would encourage people to pass on information to Federal officials with responsibility for preventing, protecting against, disrupting, or responding to a terrorist act or to Federal, State, and local law enforcement officials without fear of being sued for doing their civic duty. Only disclosures made to those responsible officials would be protected by the legislation.

Once a report is received, those officials would be responsible for assessing its reasonableness and determining whether further action is required. If they take reasonable action to mitigate the reported threat, they, too, would be protected from lawsuits. Just as we should not discourage reporting suspicious incidents, we also should not discourage reasonable responses to them.

Let me make very clear that this bill does not offer any protection whatsoever if an individual makes a statement that he or she knows to be false. No one will be able to use this protection as cover for mischievous, vengeful, or biased falsehoods.

Our laws and legal system must not be hijacked to intimidate people into silence or to prevent our officials from responding to terrorist threats. Protecting citizens who make good faith reports--and that's an important condition in this bill--of potentially lethal activities is essential to maintaining our homeland security. Our bill offers protection in a measured way that discourages abuses from either side.

Each of us has an important responsibility in the fight against terrorism. It is not a fight that can be left to law enforcement alone. The police simply can't be everywhere. Whether at a hotel, a mall, or an arena, homeland security and law enforcement officials need all citizens to alert them to unattended packages and behavior that appears out of the ordinary.

Many national organizations, such as the Fraternal Order of Police, the National Sheriffs' Association, the National Troopers Coalition, and the National Association of Town Watch, support this legislation.

If someone ``sees something'' suspicious, Congress has an obligation to ensure that he or she will ``say something'' about it. This bill promotes and protects that civic duty. I urge my colleagues to support it.