DHS proposed FY2009 budget request: Highlights
DHS requests $50.5 billion in funding for FY 2009, an increase of 6.8 percent over FY2008; big ticket item: $1.3 billion request for department-wide efforts to counter IED threats
Follow the money. President Bush’s fiscal year 2009 budget request for DHS calls for $50.5 billion in funding, which is an increase of 6.8 percent over the 2008 fiscal year level — excluding funds provided in emergency supplemental funding. The request targets five areas which are “essential to preserving freedom and privacy, meeting future challenges, and fulfilling our mission of securing America,” DHS says. Democrats in Congress already announced their strong objections to Bush’s proposed over-all budget (Senator Kent Conrad of North Dakota said that this was not even a case of “dead-on-arrival” budget — but rather a “dead-on-departure” budget), so we are likely to see many changes to the proposed DHS budget in the months to come. Still, it is worthwhile to look at the proposed budget’s highlights to understand where the department’s prioirities are and where it is going to spend its money in the coming fiscal year (our advice to investors and M&A specialists: Give serious consideration to explosives detection technology). Here are the main highlights of the proposed budget:
Protection from dangerous people
* An increase of $442.4 million to hire, train, and equip 2,200 new Border Patrol Agents. The additional agents represent the fiscal 2009 increment of adding 6,000 new Border Patrol Agents by the end of the first quarter of fiscal year 2009
* Total funding of $140 million to support U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative (WHTI) to implement the rollout of WHTI to land and sea ports of entry after 1 June 2009. WHTI is mandated by law and requires that all travelers present acceptable documents for entry into the United States.
* Total funding of $100 million for E-Verify. This U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services program allows employers to use an automated system to verify name, date of birth, and Social Security Number, along with immigration information for non-citizens, against federal databases to confirm the employment eligibility of both citizen and non-citizen new hires. The program will deploy additional staff to include information status verifiers, and compliance and monitoring staff
* An increase of $30 million will support the Transportation Security Administration’s (TSA) vetting programs to stabilize and enhance the agency’s multiple systems such as crew vetting, Secure Identification Display Area checks, and the Alien Flight Student program.
* An increase of $32 million will accelerate implementation of the Secure Flight program by replacing the current airline-managed passenger vetting
