DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano has said that "maturing" her department is among the programmatic goals ahead.
"DHS is a young department. Its components must further evolve in order to operate aseffectively as possible as one agency with a single, unified security mission," she told a Senate hearing. She noted that the fiscal 2010 budget proposal contains funding to initiate consolidation of mission support activities that will remain off-site from the St. Elizabeths campus, "reducing the many small and widely scattered leased locations and supporting the goal to build ‘One DHS.’"
The budget request of $55.1 billion is 5 percent above the fiscal 2009 enacted amount, she said, and includes increased funding in areas such as improved cybersecurity for federal agencies, increased staffing to address firearms and currency smuggling, and additional air and marine patrol personnel.
She also pointed to the internal efficiency review she started in late March to address issues such as reducing non-essential travel, saving on subscription and printing costs, using refurbished IT equipment, assessing the workforce to find the best mix of full-time, part-time and contractor personnel, improving energy efficiency and similar steps.
