SHARE

Monterey CA - July 2010

CHDS Launches Program for Fusion Center Directors

CHDS Faculty member Robert Simeral speaks to 24 fusion center leaders from around the country. At left is John McCreary, chief analysis officer with KGS Inc.

In an effort to mature and strengthen the management capabilities of fusion center leaders through academic homeland security coursework, the Naval Postgraduate School Center for Homeland Defense and Security (CHDS) launched its inaugural executive level educational program for fusion center directors during a one-week session June 21-25, 2010.

Twenty-four intelligence professionals across all levels of government participated in the program, which addressed the critical questions facing state and major urban area fusion center leaders and their roles in homeland security.

The Fusion Centers Leaders Program (FCLP) is the latest pilot educational program from CHDS, which was the first institution to offer a master’s degree in homeland security. The program, sponsored by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), was developed based on input from interagency partners, including the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and Department of Justice (DOJ), and state and local partners through the Criminal Intelligence Coordinating Council (CICC) and National Fusion Center Association (NFCA).

DHS, in coordination with its interagency partners, supported the development of the program to enhance the management capabilities across the national network of fusion centers and enable best practices in information sharing and leadership to be shared among the fusion center directors.

"The Department is committed to providing the resources and best practices necessary to enhance the national network of fusion centers," said Bart R. Johnson, principal deputy under secretary of the DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis. "The Fusion Center Leadership Program represents one of the Department’s on-going initiatives to support fusion centers in achieving the Baseline Capabilities for State and Major Urban Area Fusion Centers."

By achieving this baseline level of capability, a fusion center will have the necessary structures, processes and tools in place to support the gathering, processing, analysis, and dissemination of terrorism, homeland security, and law enforcement information.

The program materialized after discussions among the nation’s leading experts on fusion center operations, said CHDS faculty member Robert Simeral.

"I think we recognize there was truly a void," said David Pyle, deputy director of the Homeland Security and Law Enforcement division of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. "We had no other educational program or opportunity out there to support fusion centers. I think it really nests nicely with the NPS CHDS master’s degree program and the Executive Leaders Program. It has a lot of overlap with those programs, but it’s specific to the fusion center leaders."

Speakers and facilitators during the program included representatives from all levels of government, as well as multi-disciplinary partners, including the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, the New York City Fire Department, the American Civil Liberties Union and the private sector.

"That interaction, I thought, was very important," said Ron Brooks, director of the Northern California Regional Intelligence Center. "It’s time to educate a cadre of people who can continue to manage fusion centers. We need to make sure the people managing these centers have the best education and guidance possible."

The sessions highlighted fusion center critical operational capabilities, including (1) ability to receive classified and unclassified information from federal partners; (2) ability to assess local implications of threat information through the use of a formal risk assessment process; (3) ability to disseminate threat information to other state, local, tribal, territorial, and private sector entities within their jurisdiction; and (4) the ability to gather locally generated information, aggregate it, analyze it, and share it with federal partners.

Throughout the program, participants had the opportunity to discuss, debate and engage in dialogue around these pivotal issues as well as other fusion center management challenges. Discussion among these leaders highlighted the continued need to refine fusion center operations and capabilities, said Simeral.

Recognizing that fusion centers are owned and operated by state and local partners, the program also focused on building standard capability and enhancing management capacities to enable fusion centers to operate at an enhanced level of capability.

"We didn’t want a training course," Pyle said. "We wanted an executive level educational program that would present learning objectives pertaining to intelligence, fusion centers and operating a complex organization."

"It’s an opportunity for critical thinking with regard to managing fusion center operations," said New Jersey State Police Lt. Ray Guidetti, who is the intelligence manager in the Analysis Element of New Jersey’s Regional Operations Intelligence Center. "It allows the opportunity to discuss critical issues such as privacy and civil liberties, management and personnel issues, and sustainability."

Among the expert facilitators was John Miller, ODNI Assistant Deputy Director of National Intelligence for Analytic Transformation and Technology, who discussed with students the evolving nature of the terrorism threat. One of the most important things that come out of the program is the beginning of a network that shares common challenges.

Since 9/11, Miller said, the threat has shifted from one driven by al-Qaida to a more decentralized movement that capitalizes on globalization and the Internet to lure recruits from U.S. soil to commit violent acts. He pointed to the foiled Times Square bombing in May 2010 and a plot to build bombs hatched in the suburbs of Denver last fall among examples where planning was conducted far from big-city targets. These kinds of domestically executed attacks heighten the importance of the work fusion centers do, he added.

"We have been very effective in terms of our strategy in crushing the organizational structure of al-Qaida and keeping its leadership on the run," Miller said. "The unintended consequence of that is the use of modern communications to generate mass appeals which may result in only a few people coming forward who embrace the terrorist ideology, but a few people are all it takes.

"When you look at the plots, the plotters, the planning, and even the building of the bombs in some cases, it hasn’t happened in New York or Washington," he added. "That happened in small towns outside of Denver; they’ve happened in small towns in Connecticut and rural parts of Illinois. Just because the biggest targets might not be in your area of operation that doesn’t mean the threat might not be lurking there even if the target is somewhere else."

SHARE

add tags