Hawai'i's federal workers await Homeland change

By Timothy Hurley
Advertiser Staff Writer

Several thousand federal employees in Hawai'i face an uncertain future as they await word on switching hats to join the ranks of the Department of Homeland Security.

Congress approved the newest federal department Friday, and President Bush said he plans to sign the bill, launching the largest federal reorganization since the Defense Department was created in 1947.

Nationwide, the department will boast 170,000 employees pulled from what are now 22 separate federal agencies, including the Coast Guard, Customs, and the Immigration and Naturalization Service.

What it means for Hawai'i remains uncertain.

"To be honest, I don't have any idea what the impact will be here,'' said Adm. Ralph Utley, commander of the 14th Coast Guard District based in Honolulu.

"It's too early to tell," added Donald A. Radcliffe, who oversees 260 employees as INS district director in Hawai'i.

Utley, who oversees a force of 2,000, said that while he hasn't received any marching orders, it will be interesting to see what roles will change within the agencies joining the new department. A number of the agencies have functions that aren't directly related to homeland security.

The Coast Guard, for example, spends only 25 percent of its time on activities related to national security, a percentage that increased markedly after the Sept. 11 attacks. Other functions include search and rescue, environmental protection, marine safety, drug enforcement, fisheries enforcement and migrant interdiction.

Utley added that he understands the name and tradition of the Coast Guard will be maintained, that the legislation simply calls for the agency to be plucked intact from the Department of Transportation.

By contrast, there's absolutely no tradition with the Transportation Security Administration, which was created only this year to federalize airport screeners in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks.

The TSA, now under the Department of Transportation, only recently hired hundreds of screeners for the airports across Hawai'i.

Sidney Hayakawa, security director at Honolulu International Airport, said he wouldn't venture any guesses regarding the future of his agency.

"I haven't been told yet what's happening," he said. "I read the bill. It's very confusing."

Hawai'i's acting U.S. Customs Service port director, Harley Carter, said he would expect the transition to take perhaps a year. But he didn't think it would be especially difficult or painful for his statewide force of 186.

"There will be differences in functions of various individuals, but I don't think we'll change greatly," he said.

Carter said he didn't know if his office, which is currently in the Treasury Department, would be absorbing personnel or giving up some to other agencies.

"We're standing by to stand by," he said.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency is another agency joining the Department of Homeland Security. In Hawai'i, it's best known for coordinating relief efforts following hurricanes.

But Jean Baker, regional spokesperson for FEMA, said the president's budget had already proposed an expanded homeland security role for the agency, running the new Office of National Preparedness, coordinating federal efforts to help state and local governments and emergency responders to be better prepared for the consequences of all hazards, including acts of terrorism.

Baker said Hawai'i and the rest of the country will benefit from creation of the new department because it will give FEMA access to information that it will allow it to move more swiftly toward "national preparedness."

Gov.-elect Linda Lingle has indicated she's hoping the state can derive some benefits from the new department. On the campaign trail, she promised to lobby Homeland Security director Tom Ridge to make Hawai'i the Pacific center for homeland security.

In a television interview Tuesday from a meeting of the Republican Governors Association in California, Lingle predicted that Hawai'i, with its location between Asia and the U.S. Mainland, would play a bigger role in the county's national defense.

As for new Department of Homeland Security workers, not only do they face the possibility of change in the workplace, but many of them will find themselves without their customary civil service job protections, an issue that held up approval of the department for months.