GOVERNMENT POLICY NOTES

December 2004

Troubled Security Clearance Program Needs Fixing

by Peter M. Steffes

For the past decade or more, the defense industry has witnessed an alarming decline in the federal government's ability to process the background investigations needed to approve security clearances for the industry's civilian workers. The clearances are required before those employees are allowed to perform critical national security work.

Not only are investigations slow, but the entire clearance program lacks standardization and reciprocity among defense and intelligence agencies, creating a diverse bureaucracy that is reluctant to embrace change.

As background, the government regularly conducts security investigations on military personnel, civilian employees of the government and those working for private defense contractors to determine if it is clearly in the national interest to grant them access to classified information and whether that access should be continued. Such investigations look into an individual's behavior, conduct and activity, past and present, in order to determine the subject's of trustworthiness, honesty, character, loyalty, reliability and financial responsibility.

Industry must obtain and renew security clearances for its workforce in order to perform important and vital work for the government. The backlog for such cases is significant and growing. On average, it now takes more than a year to conduct a background investigation on a contractor's employee, adjudicate the result, and grant, deny or approve the continuation of a top secret clearance. This waiting time is unlikely to be reduced drastically in the near term.

For years, the government has assured industry that improvements are underway and that average completion times would reach 120 days for top secret and 90 days for secret. This goal has not been fulfilled. Extended processing time significantly impacts industry in a number of ways. For example, it increases the competitive labor costs for new hires and keeps cleared employees with outdated investigations from working on important programs.

Further compounding the recent increase in the backlog was the planned transfer of responsibility of background investigations from the Defense Security Service to the Office of Personnel Management in October 2003. While some aspects of this transfer have taken place, such as the training of DSS investigators on the OPM clearance investigative system, a decision on whether OPM will assume full responsibility for DSS investigations is still pending.

A growing concern within industry and Congress is that the clearance program is partially broken. The timeframe to conduct investigations and get individuals cleared is unacceptable.

The current system also lacks sufficient capacity to conduct the growing demand for backlog of investigations. It does not employ the technology and processes required today to get the job done.

The system is bifurcated, allowing agencies to establish their own clearance and investigative requirements, and to ignore the basic tenet of reciprocity, whereby one federal agency recognizes security clearances granted by another.

While fixing responsibility seems fundamental to repairing the problems, industry should know that there is some good news to go along with the bad.

The Defense Department routinely has been issuing interim secret clearances to industry employees who meet specified criteria based on an initial review of their personnel security questionnaire. These reviews are performed by the processing center for industry, the Defense Industrial Security Clearance Office, within DSS.

DISCO also routinely issues interim top-secret clearances when a favorable national agency check has been completed as part of the personnel security investigation.

The introduction of the joint personnel adjudication system has enhanced industry's ability to get previously cleared personnel into a productive situation. JPAS is the Defense Department's system of record for security information for use by the department's central adjudication facilities, security managers, special security officers and the defense industrial security community. With an existing eligibility reflected in JPAS, industry now is able to grant up to top-secret access in the morning and have a cleared person working in the afternoon.

Added resources in both the investigative and adjudicative roles, as well as the outsourcing of investigations, all have served to mitigate the problems, in part.

There have been numerous white papers, testimony before Congress and letters to the defense secretary recommending improvements. NDIA has been a consistent and important contributor to efforts to enhance the clearance program.

It appears that all of these efforts may be coming to a favorable resolution. As National Defense goes to press, Congress is putting the final touches on the Intelligence Reorganization Act, intended to enact into law the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission Report. In both the Senate and House proposals, there are significant changes addressing the responsibility and execution of security clearances. The House version would require:

. The new intelligence director to oversee all federal security clearance efforts.

. A multi-agency database to handle all security clearances.

. That all security clearances be cleared within 120 days.

The Senate version would require the president to designate a single agency to handle all security clearances and to set uniform standards for processing clearance applications.

Whichever version finally is signed into law, the process for granting security clearances would be improved significantly, as long as adequate resources, personnel and funding are provided.

To be productive and efficient in executing government contracts, the defense industry needs an assurance that all submitted clearance applications will be processed and investigated in a reasonable period of time.

While clearance reform, process improvements and a 21st Century fix are needed-and may be on the way-new investigative resources must be found and funded to solve the near term problem.

Industry desperately needs for completed investigations and clearances issued more quickly. This is necessary in order for contractors to fulfill their contractual obligation, and that is to provide the weapons, equipment and services that help defend and protect the country and its citizens.

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