FWJG critical of IN Homeland Security

The Fort Wayne Journal Gazette has an editorial critical of the efforts of Indiana’s Department of Homeland Security.

The Indiana Department of Homeland Security’s failure to prepare a list of critical infrastructure and key assets, as Dan Stockman’s Sunday story detailed, may not indicate complete incompetence. But the failure to compile the list, as the national homeland security strategy dictates, raises questions about whether the state is doing what is necessary to keep Hoosiers safe.

Even more troubling is that state homeland security officials can’t even figure out what constitutes critical infrastructure or key assets despite the fairly comprehensive definitions given in the national strategy. For example, there appears to be a discrepancy about whether state assets, such at the Statehouse, are in the jurisdiction of local agencies or the state homeland security department. State officials say the Statehouse is part of Marion County’s infrastructure, but Marion County officials did not initially include state-owned assets on their homeland security list.

The dispute indicates there is a lack of effective communication between local homeland security agencies and state officials.

The Dan Stockman article referenced is here. In part it says:

[I]n February 2003, the federal government released its national strategy for protecting critical infrastructure and key assets, detailing what needed to be done.

“Like the federal government, states should identify and secure the critical infrastructures and key assets under their control,” the strategy says.

And just in case officials were unsure of what constitutes a critical infrastructure or key assets, the national strategy explains there are 13 types of critical infrastructure – from agriculture to transportation – and three types of key assets, from monuments and icons to industry and technology to commercial centers and anywhere crowds gather, such as sports stadiums. It then devotes a chapter to each type.

But three years after the national strategy was released, Indiana still cannot say what its critical infrastructure and key assets are.