The report faulted collaboration on hiring efforts. Image: JL IMAGES/Shutterstock.com
By: FEDweek StaffGAO has said that the latest of several moves of the Federal Protective Service did not solve the agency’s staffing problems, which included a 21 percent vacancy rate as of the end of fiscal 2021.
FPS, which oversees physical security at some 9,000 GSA owned or leased federal facilities, had been moved from GSA to DHS when that department was created two decades ago. It has moved twice while within DHS, most recently in 2019 from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency to the management directorate.
However, through that time it “has faced long-standing challenges in carrying out some of its activities, including overseeing Protective Security Officers (i.e., contract guards) and managing human capital issues,” said the GAO. Among them, it said, is meeting hiring goals, especially for in “less popular, remote locations.”
“These staffing challenges persist in part because FPS and the management directorate’s human capital office have not sufficiently collaborated on hiring processes. Mechanisms to facilitate further collaboration and agreement on hiring processes and to document the agreements reached could help the human capital office and FPS more effectively and efficiently address FPS’s staffing shortages,” it said.
It added that the FPS has established performance measures and targets for some of its most critical activities such as facility security assessments but has not done so for training of its employees and that while it has measures for human capital management, it lacks targets.
The report said that DHS agreed with recommendations to improve hiring processes and fully develop performance measures with targets for its mission areas.
The FPS has about 1,300 employees, about three-fourths of them in law enforcement, while it oversees about 10 times that many contract security guards.
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