ASIS Fredericksburg/Quantico Newsletteroctober 2009
ASIS Fredericksburg/Quantico NewsletterOctober 2009
The Next Meeting is Tuesday, October 20, 6:30 pm, at Mickey Finn Detachment, Marine Corps League, Triangle. The address is 18736 Fuller Heights Road.
Directions are as follows.
Off of I-95, take Exit 150B towards Quantico Marine Corps Base. Cross US 1 and just before the Main Gate turn left onto Fuller Heights Road. The Mickey Finn Building is first on the right. The entrance is a side porch on the far side. If you have any questions on the location, contact one of the board members.
For more information, contact one of the chapter officers listed below.
Chairman Santo Polizzi (571) 227-1565;
Vice-Chairman Ira Weiss (703) 323-4940 x12;
Secretary Terry Ryan (703) 440-8834;
Treasurer Gene Morabito 540-657-7012
John Muzzi; (703) 631-9887.
CHAIRMAN’S CHAT
Happy Halloween to all…
We are fast approaching the end of the year and all that goes with it; to include holidays and travel.
In the course of your holiday plans, please take a moment to remember those who serve and are unable to be home for the holidays with their loved ones.
I received notification that the schedule for the 2010 ASIS certification classroom reviews have been set. The first session offered in our region will be in New York City February 12-13. Sessions for CPP and PSP will be offered. For additional information and registration, log on to ASISOnline.org.
For those of you who attended the ASIS conference in Anaheim, we would love to hear all about it; the goods, the others… The 2010 conference will be held in Dallas, Texas, so start planning.
This month’s speaker will be Matt Hollandsworth, CISSP, CPP, and member the ASIS Information Technology Security Council. Matt will discuss the purpose and activities of the council. Matt is also a Senior Security Manager for Booz, Allen and Hamilton in Herndon.
Still looking for highly motivated members for upcoming board elections. Throw your name in the hat by contacting one of the current board members. Nominations are due by the November 17th meeting, with elections held at the annual holiday party in December. Speaking of the holiday party, this year’s party/meeting will be held on Saturday, December 5th, 7pm, at the Weiss residence. RSVP to Ira at by November 13, 2009.
See you all Tuesday night
Santo
Professional Development
OCTOBER
Oct. 25-27
Enhanced Violence Assessment and Management
Westin Casurina
Las Vegas, Nev
Oct. 26-30, 2009
ISC East 2009
New York, NY.
Contact: Ed Nichols at 203-840-5968.
Oct. 27
GSN 2009 Homeland Security Awards Program
Gala Dinner,
New York, NY,
Contact Bill Rutledge, 212-866-2169.
Oct. 27
3rd Annual Fred V. Morrone Nine-Eleven Award Dinner, Contact Bill Rutledge, 212-866-2169.
Oct. 28-29
Active Shooter: Prevention, Intervention, and Response
Westin Casurina
Las Vegas
NOVEMBER
Nov. 4
Achieving Operational Interoperability Through Emerging Standards
Webinar
Nov. 16‑19
Global Gaming Expo G2E
Las Vegas, Nev.
Nov. 16‑19
Assets Protection Course I - Concepts and Methods
Philadelphia, Penn.
Hyatt Regency Philadelphia
Nov. 20
Return on Investment (ROI): How to Successfully Sell Security to Management
Philadelphia, Penn.
Nov. 30‑Dec. 4
Wharton ASIS Program for Security Executives
Philadelphia, Penn.
DECEMBER
Dec. 6‑8
ASIS International 1st Middle East Security Conference
Dubai, United Arab Emirates
Dec. 7‑8
Executive Protection
The Fairmont
Washington, DC
Dec. 7‑9
Transportation Security: Is Your Cargo Really Secure?
Hilton Walt Disney World
Lake Buena Vista, Fla.
Opinion
Cutting back on Border Patrol?
Standard-Times
Oct 12
San Angelo, Texas — Recent reports that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security may cut back on the number of Border Patrol agents along the southern border have made U.S. Sens. John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, John McCain and John Kyl of Arizona and several others very nervous.
Nervous enough to write DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano a letter, asking for reassurance that no such cuts are being planned — “We would like you to confirm that the current strength of 17,415 agents will be maintained or increased in fiscal year 2010,” the letter reads.
Hopefully the reports of border agent cutbacks are indeed erroneous. Surely Napolitano is aware of the extreme concerns of border states regarding the spillover of violence from Mexico.
Surely Napolitano, former governor of Arizona, is aware of the importance of securing the border. Since President Barack Obama chose her to head the DHS, he too likely was thinking about border security. Only two months ago, Napolitano announced $30 million in grants, including nearly $13 million to Texas, to help border cities keep the violence from spilling over.
Following an August summit in Mexico, Napolitano stated that border security would require addressing illegal immigration, drug trafficking and violence in Mexico.
“For the first time,” she said, “our two countries are treating this issue of the drug cartels and border-related violence as a shared problem.”
Since immigration reform seems to be on the back burner for now in the Obama administration, it would be helpful to see at least some action on the drug cartels and violence.
In 2008, more than 5,000 people were killed in drug and gang wars in Mexico. A Defense Department report last year stated that Mexico could destabilize rapidly. If that happens, we could see refugees and even a complete breakdown of law and order.
As Napolitano noted, any real fix will require the full cooperation of both the Mexican and U.S. governments. Unless the U.S. can somehow diminish the demand for drugs, the Mexican drug cartels will continue to supply that demand, and the violence will go on. The Mexican government also needs to muster the strength and determination to destroy the powerful, wealthy drug cartels.
Hopefully both governments will cooperate in developing plans that actually do some good.
In the News
Border Fence requirement stripped from Homeland Security bill
Asociated Press
Oct. 11, 2009
Brownsville, Tex. (AP) — Congress has stripped a provision from a Department of Homeland Security appropriation bill that would have required 300 more miles of tall fencing along the Mexican border, saying the money needed to build the barrier would be better spent on alternative security measures.
If the amendment, by Senator Jim DeMint, Republican of South Carolina, had remained, tall fencing to stop illegal immigrants and smugglers on foot would have been installed along 700 miles of border, a plan opposed by many officials and border residents.
Mr. DeMint’s provision, which was dropped this week, stated that 300 miles of low-rise vehicle barriers and virtual fencing planned for the area could not count toward the 700 miles of barrier the government had promised to build. Virtual fencing includes cameras and sensors.
“The DeMint amendment represented an unproductive and inefficient border security strategy,” Representative Henry Cuellar, Democrat of Texas, said Thursday. “We need to invest and secure our border and our land ports without being tied down to an amendment that is out of touch with border needs.”
Mr. Cuellar said the proposal would have cost $6.5 billion, money he said would be better spent on other measures. Among those who voted for the DeMint amendment in July were Senators John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, both Republicans. Ms. Hutchison is running for governor.
The provision by Mr. DeMint was not included in the House version of the $42.8 billion spending bill and had been expected to be stripped during conference when the two bills were melded.
Seven border state congressmen asked the House leadership in July to strip the amendment from the final bill.
The General Accounting Office reported last month that maintaining the border fence would cost $6.5 billion over the next 20 years. That would be on top of the $2.4 billion spent to build it.
Mr. DeMint voiced his disappointment Friday. “Democrats are gutting the best tool we have to secure our borders,” he said.
House subcommittee aims to tighten federal chemical plant oversight
Nick Snow
Washington Editor
Oil & Gas Journal
Oct. 16
WASHINGTON, DC, — A US House subcommittee passed chemical security legislation Oct. 14 that critics said would change federal regulations that have not been fully implemented.
The Energy and Commerce Committee’s Energy and Environment Subcommittee approved HR 2868, the Chemical Security Anti-Terrorism Act of 2009, by 18 to 10 votes and referred it to the full committee. The bill would amend the 2002 Homeland Security Act by adding a title regulating security practices at US chemical facilities, including refineries and petrochemical plants.
If it becomes law, the measure would give the secretary of the US Department of Homeland Security authority to designate a chemical as a “substance of concern” and set limits on how much of such substances could be used, stored, processed, manufactured, or distributed at a regulated installation. Risk-based regulated tiers would be assigned for each covered site, which would be notified within 60 days of its designation or any change in it.
The DHS secretary also would have to develop regulations establishing risk-based and performance-based standards, protocols, and procedures for mandatory security vulnerability assessments and site security plans and set deadlines by tier for completing both. The secretary would approve or disapprove security assessments and plans within 180 days of their submission. Covered plants would have to review and resubmit security assessments and plansat least every 5 years.
The bill also would establish an Office of Chemical Security within DHS, require covered plants to establish security background checks for employees and others with access to the plant’s restricted areas, and allow citizens to sue a covered plant alleging violation of the law or the DHS secretary alleging failure to enforce it.
‘Making a mistake’
The measure drew fire from the full committee’s ranking minority member. “I think we’re making a mistake. I think we’re making significant changes to a chemical facility security program that’s not even been fully implemented yet,” said Rep. Joe Barton (R-Tex.) as markup of the bill began before the vote. “I think we should wait until it is implemented before we decide to change it.”
Chemical security applies to a broad swath of the US economy, from hospitals to farms to factories as well as chemical plants, Barton said, adding, “We should at least identify and understand the problem we are trying to fix before we rush head-long into legislation. We seem to be approaching this from the perspective of crafting a solution in search of a problem.”
In a statement following the vote, National Petrochemical & Refiners Association Pres. Charles T. Drevna also noted that current federal chemical facility antiterrorism standards still are in the process of being implemented and should at least have the opportunity to take effect before changes are made.
NPRA also believes mandating an “inherently safer technology” program for facilities in the two highest tiers, as the legislation proposes, is unnecessary, he added. “IST is an engineering philosophy, not a technique, nor is it a panacea for security. Forced chemical switching under an IST mandate will not necessarily result in safer operations, and in fact, may result in increased risks to facilities, their employees, the public, and the environment,” Drevna said.
Increased regulatory and financial burdens under an IST mandate would likely cause many petrochemical and refining businesses to consider simply moving their operations overseas, he warned. “Unfortunately, this bill appears to be nothing more than an attempt to further a partisan environmental agenda in the name of security,” he said.
Loophole allows minors to bypass airport security
By Dylan Rivera
The Oregonian
Oct. 11
When an Oregon teen talked his way onto an airplane bound for Chicago last weekend, he unknowingly revealed a little-known hole in airport security.
Kids don't have to show photo ID.
That may come as a surprise to many air travelers. Since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, travelers are accustomed to removing their shoes, not carrying liquids and otherwise coping with strict protocols of airport security.
But when it comes to conducting minors through airports, security and efforts to preserve air passenger convenience intersect in a highly unusual way.
The Transportation Security Administration requires all air travelers 18 and older to show a boarding pass and government-issued photo ID to enter security screening.
But minors generally don't have government-issued IDs. So security officers don't expect them to have one, says Dwayne Baird, the TSA's public information officer for the Northwest.
"An individual who's a minor, in order to get through security, would have to have a boarding pass," Baird says. "They'd have to show some documentation that they had a reason to get through there."
The policy allows anyone who looks like a teenager to enter an airport security checkpoint, as long as they have an airline-issued boarding pass. In the case of minors, no one is responsible for making sure that the person using the boarding pass is in fact the person named on the pass.
On Oct. 3, that gap allowed a 6-foot-2, 14-year-old boy from Canby to pass through airport security with a boarding pass that had his mother's name, Virginia Davis, on it.
A TSA screener asked Dakota M. Davis, "Are you Virginia?"
"Uh-huh," he mumbled, and advanced into the security checkpoint line and onto a flight to Chicago's O'Hare International Airport.
The identification loophole doesn't worry the TSA, Baird says. Even if you're not really the person named on your boarding pass, the TSA says, you will still have to go through security screening.
"Every passenger regardless of age is properly screened through multiple layers of security and deemed not to be a threat to aviation security before getting on a flight," Baird says.
Social service agencies say that it's almost unheard of for a runaway teen to go by airplane, but some recent incidents show daring teens have been able to sneak through.
In April, a 13-year-old from Boca Raton, Fla., stole his dad's Ford Explorer and credit card and caught a flight to California to visit his mother. Later, the boy calmly explained how he did it to a national TV audience.
In 2007, a 9-year-old boy sneaked through security at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport and made it as far as San Antonio before being caught by Southwest Airlines. He explained it all on another national TV show and tried the same stunt a year later.
Minors are by and large not issued any uniform government-issued ID, as adults are with driver's licenses, Baird says. So the agency feels it can't expect minors to have photo IDs.
But how do they know if an adult is posing as a minor? After all, any bartender can tell you it's difficult to distinguish a minor from an adult.
It's a judgment call.
"To a point yes, it always is," Baird says. "But that's kind of what we do."
Airlines leave security up to the TSA, says David Castelveter, spokesman for the Air Transport Association, a Washington, D.C.-based airline industry group.
"While we do try to be involved in some of the TSA's decisions, it's from a customer convenience and a carrier facilitation perspective," he says. "We leave the safety and security aspects up to the TSA."
Airlines' policies on minors traveling vary, Castelveter says. Some don't allow minors to fly without an adult, but others do.
In the days since her son flew to Chicago, Virginia Davis has learned that he memorized the numbers on a credit card she keeps hidden from Dakota and the 10 other adopted special needs children who live on her farm.
Dakota Davis has Asperger's syndrome, an autism-related disorder that limits his social interaction and interests.
Virginia Davis worries that someone in Chicago was manipulating the teen into taking the flight. He was heading for a dangerous situation, and an airport security policy that allows teens to go through security checkpoints without ID enabled him to get halfway across the country in less than a day.
Dakota sneaked out of the house in the middle of the night — a first for the teen, she says. He ordered a limousine to pick him up for a ride to the airport, also using the credit card information.
Someone in Chicago was text-messaging the boy thousands of times on a cell phone the family has only had for three weeks, Virginia Davis says. "We think that maybe he was told to do all these things," she says.
His mother and Chicago police eventually tracked Dakota down, and United Airlines issued him a return ticket home. But Virginia Davis complains neither United Airlines nor the TSA would take responsibility for allowing him on the plane in the first place.
"I found them pointing fingers," Virginia Davis says. "If it was a political cartoon, they would be pointing fingers at each other. No one's going to take responsibility. It's very serious."