Crisis management focuses mainly on law enforcement activities related to the causes of a threat or actual incident.

Consequence management focuses on the effects of an incident. It includes measures to protect public health and safety, support essential government services, and provide disaster and emergency assistance to an affected area.

FEMA uses the Federal Response Plan, or the FRP, as the vehicle to coordinate Federal consequence management activities. Over the years, the FRP has been used in numerous presidentially declared disasters and emergencies. The plan brings together 27 departments and agencies to organize Federal disaster response and recovery efforts in support of State and local requirements.

Most importantly, the FRP provides a known and flexible framework under which local, State, and Federal officials can orchestrate their response and make the most effective use of the available re

sources.

In implementing its domestic terrorism preparedness activities, FEMA strives to ensure several things: first of all that State and local responders and emergency management personnel are the focus of the Federal programs; that needs of the balance of the Nation, not just the largest cities and metropolitan areas, are addressed; that initial training is reenforced and sustained with refresher information and updated instruction; and that existing plans, capabilities, and systems are utilized as the foundation for addressing the unique requirements of WMD.

FEMA Director Witt has been working very closely with the Attorney General to better coordinate Federal interagency efforts, including support for the National Domestic Preparedness Office. In addition to supporting that office, FEMA will continue its lead agency responsibilities for consequence management.

In FY '99, FEMA is making available over $12 million in grants to States and local jurisdictions. This includes a little over 8 million for use by State emergency management agencies for planning, training, and exercises and 4 million for use by the State fire training centers to support the delivery of terrorism training programs. With respect to planning, FEMA applies experience gained in responding to natural disasters to the development of terrorism and consequence management plans and procedures. In 1997 we published the Terrorism Incident Annex to the FRP and continue to work with local, State, and Federal interagency community to refine our response.

In the area of training, FEMA has developed and delivered a number of terrorism-related courses utilizing existing networks and facilities. In particular, we rely on our National Emergency Training Center, which includes the National Fire Academy, and the Emergency Management Institute as well as State fire and emergency management training systems to deliver terrorism related training to State and local responders.

Regarding exercises, FEMA is working closely with the National Domestic Preparedness Office and the FBI and the States to ensure the development of a comprehensive exercise program. With respect to equipment, we helped develop the standardized equipment list. FEMA is very committed to work with the Federal interagency

community in coordinating our activities and programs as part of the overall Federal effort.

And we're committed to doing everything we can to better prepare the States and local jurisdictions for dealing with this immense challenge.

Thank you again for the opportunity to address this subcommittee.

Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you. Secretary Cragin.

Mr. CRAGIN. Thank you. Good afternoon, Chairman Fowler, Mr. Traficant, Chairman Shays. My pleasure to be with you this after

noon.

I would like to discuss the activities of the Department of Defense as a participant in the Federal Response Plan, which Ms. Light referred to in supporting State and local officials in response to incidents involving weapons of mass destruction.

Since President Clinton signed presidential decision directive 62 in May of 1998, significant progress has been made in our efforts to better support State and local authorities. PDD 62, also known as the Combating Terrorism Directive, highlighted the growing threat of unconventional attacks against the United States, and it detailed a new and more systematic method of fighting terrorism here at home by bringing a program management approach to our national counterterrorism efforts.

The directive also established, as you are aware, within the National Security Council, the Office of the National Coordinator for Security, Infrastructure Protection and Counterterrorism to oversee these efforts.

Under that oversight aspect, as Ms. Light has mentioned, two Federal agencies have been designated as the lead Federal agencies, the agencies in charge to handle crisis management, the Department of Justice, FBI, and consequence management, the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Last year with respect to DOD activities, Congress authorized the creation of 10 National Guard Rapid Assessment and Initial Detection teams. Each RAID team will be composed of 22 full-time National Guard personnel.

These RAID teams are designed to be both State and Federal assets that can initially be deployed by governors. And each team will perform three vital tasks: first, they'll deploy rapidly to help local incident commanders identify and assess the nature and extent of a suspected radiological or biological or chemical event.

I might insert parenthetically in the Tokyo subway attack it was over 3 hours before the Tokyo officials were able to ascertain that they were in fact dealing with sarin gas.

Second, the teams will provide technical advice to civilian first responders regarding such matters as NBC symptoms or casualties, the appropriate decontamination procedures and risk management procedures.

As we look at this map that you have placed up there we see a lot of America that doesn't have the sophistication of an Orange County or a New York City or a Chicago when it comes to dealing with these issues. And where can we say that the next event will occur in America.

And third, these teams will facilitate requests for assistance by identifying needed follow-up by military support and coordinating with local, State, and Federal emergency managers for the utilization of these military support elements.

Another very important mission of the RAID teams once they are stood up, and they are still in training and will not be, in fact, ready to deploy until January of 2000, is that they will continuously work with the first-responder communities to develop and improve emergency response plans and procedures and train and exercise with the local incident commanders who will, in fact, be in charge in the event an incident occurs within their jurisdiction.

The personnel for these 10 teams have been hired. They're undergoing very rigorous training. In August, they'll begin training together as units. And, as I say, we expect to have them certified for deployment early in January of-of 2000.

The Department's FY 2000 budget includes funding to increase the number of RAID teams from the 10 currently authorized to 15. However, you may be aware that the Senate Armed Services Committee recently acted to authorize a total of 27 RAID teams, 17 more than the 10 currently authorized and 12 more than the Department of Defense requested.

The House Armed Services Committee is waiting for the Department's request for full-time positions, which was time staggered as a result of the Defense Authorization Act of last year, and we'll be filing that request the first of July when permitted.

So, really, for the year 2000 we really don't know exactly how many RAID teams are going to be authorized throughout the United States. And a decision on stationing of these new RAID teams will be made once Congress has determined the final number to be authorized in the fiscal year 00.

Those teams will be placed throughout the United States according to criteria such as response times, relative to population density, the proximity of other assets to respond to a WMD incident, and the accessibility of airlift transportation to transport RAID team members to incident sites.

And when we established the first 10 teams, one in each FEMA region, one of the criterion was to look to see that there was National Guard organic airlift capability available to provide that airlift. Because, obviously, if you have one in each of the 10 FEMA regions, you're not going to get to a lot of places in that region by getting in your van and heading to the scene immediately.

We're also, as part of Secretary Cohen's program to support local and State officials and to support our civilian Federal agencies who, as I said, are in charge, we're going to be training and equipping 43 chem-bio reconnaissance elements and 127 decontamination elements that are resident in our Army Reserve, our Army National Guard, our Air Force Reserve, and our Air National Guard enabling them to more effectively respond to a WMD event.

In addition, and at the direction of Congress this past year, the Department is working to establish what we were directed to establish, what we call RAID light teams, that John Eversole referred to in his testimony in each of the States and territories where a RAID team has not been located to date.

Last October, Congress also directed that we utilize our existing training technologies to expand the training base available to civilian first responders. We're collaborating with other Federal agencies to adapt and convert WMD preparedness courses so that they may be used throughout our advanced distributed learning process. Through this shared use concept, these and future courses will be available to both the Federal interagency community and the Nation's 2 million first responders. And as you're also aware and it's been alluded to a number of times this afternoon-the Department of Defense is administering the Domestic Preparedness Program, the so-called Nunn, Lugar and Domenici Act, which provides WMD preparedness training for 120 of America's largest cities.

The program focuses on providing initial awareness, protection, decontamination, and detection training. It is not the sort of ongoing sustainment training that you heard Ms. Light refer to with respect to FEMA's activities.

To date, we have trained 58 cities involving over 15,700 responders. And as part of this program, we have worked with other Federal agencies to compile a compendium of Federal weapons of mass destruction preparedness courses, the training courses that you mentioned earlier today, so that these courses can be available to State and local agencies.

And a final version was published in July of last year and is available on the Internet. And in the past year, both the Department of Defense and the Department of Justice have conducted a number of forums with first responders. Chief Eversole has been an energetic participant in those forums. And you heard him say that one of the things we need is one-stop shopping.

And frankly, we heard Chief Eversole and his colleagues in the State and local capacities and that was one of the reasons that, one, the Department of Defense agreed with the Department of Justice to transition the Domestic Preparedness Program from the Department of Defense to Justice, so that they would have it in the same location with their equipment grant training programs, hence one-stop shopping.

And then the National Domestic Preparedness Office was established under the auspices of the FBI-and Ms. Martinez will speak to you in detail about that-but as a means to coordinate the provision of services from the Federal Government, not to be the provider of all services, but to ensure that there was a one-stop shop for dealing with State and local officials.

And we're frankly very pleased with the progress that's been made in the past year under PDD 62 and the interagency working groups. And I can tell you, in spite of some of the testimony that you've heard to date, these ladies here and I talk on a regular basis and we talk among our interagency colleagues; and, in fact, we do know each other's phone numbers and use them regularly. Thank you, Madam Chairman.

Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you, Secretary Cragin. Ms. Martinez.

Ms. MARTINEZ. Thank you, Mr. Cragin. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. And thank you for the opportunity to speak before distinguished members of Congress, my colleagues, regarding the proposed role of the National Domestic Preparedness Office in combating terrorism within the United States.

My intent is to highlight the importance of achieving coordination across the Federal Government of the various individual agency efforts that provide very valuable assistance to State and local communities in preparing them to face a challenge that terrorism presents.

As over 40 Federal agencies would have a role in the response to a terrorist event, so too are many of them in a logical position to provide valuable assistance to prepare our communities before such an event occurs. The mission of the proposed National Domestic Preparedness Office consistent with the recommendation made to the Attorney General by State and local authorities will be to serve as that central coordinating body for Federal programs that provide preparedness assistance to State and local communities regarding terrorist incidents, particularly those involving weapons of mass destruction.

As you know, in the past few years the President of the United States and Congress have taken significant steps to increase our national security and to promote interagency cooperation. Most recently, cooperative efforts against terrorism have been extended to include State and local agencies, professional and private sector associations as well.

For example, in the preparation of the administration's 5-year interagency counterterrorism and technology crime plan, the Attorney General directed the Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs to host a meeting of individuals like Chief Eversole who represent the various emergency response disciplines that would most likely be involved in the response to a terrorist incident.

More than 200 stakeholders representing local and State disciplines of fire services and hazmat personnel, law enforcement and public safety personnel, emergency medical and public health professionals, emergency management and other government officials, as well as various professional associations and organizations, all attended the 2-day sessions.

Collectively, they made recommendations to the Attorney General, James Lee Witt, director of FEMA, Dr. Hamre, the Deputy Secretary of Defense, and other Federal officials on ways to improve Federal assistance for State and local communities. These recommendations have been incorporated in that secret administration's 5-year plan that I mentioned.

The most critical issue identified by stakeholders was the need for a central Federal point of coordination. Due to the size and the complexity of both the problem of terrorism and the Federal Government itself, it was no surprise that the many different avenues through which aid may be acquired by State and local officials and the potential inconsistency of those programs was deemed simply overwhelming.

In essence, the Federal Government, though well intentioned, was not operating in an optimal manner, nor was it effectively serving its constituents with regard to domestic preparedness programs and issues.

State and local emergency response officials made the strong recommendation to the Attorney General for the coordination and integration of all Federal assistance programs that reach State and local authorities for terrorism preparedness.