Report: FBI Headquarters in Need of a Security Upgrade
By SDN Staff – 11.15.2011
WASHINGTON—The FBI’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., as well as several annexes in the area, do not meet current security requirements, according to a new government report.
The Government Accountability Office, which completed the report, discovered that the FBI had not performed a comprehensive security assessment at its headquarters, the J. Edgar Hoover Building, since 2002, though it had completed piecemeal assessments during the interim. Once the GAO released a confidential version of this report in July 2011, the FBI performed a new comprehensive security assessment taking into account the most recent security standards developed in 2010 by the Interagency Security Committee (ISC), which is tasked with developing security guidelines at government buildings.
The areas where security is lacking were not reported, but the recent assessment did include recommendations for security upgrades that were forwarded to the FBI’s executive management for consideration, the report said.
Completed in 1974, the Hoover building, has 2.4 million square feet of space. The FBI has 17,300 headquarters staff housed in the Hoover building and more than 40 annexes, most of which are in the D.C. area.
In addition to security shortfalls at the Hoover building, the FBI also expressed concern for security at its annexes, specifically the proximity of non-FBI tenants to FBI employees performing sensitive operations, lack of control over common areas and the slow response time required for the FBI’s internal police force to respond to events.
The FBI has increased security over the last several years at the Hoover building, including the upgrade of exterior windows and vehicle barriers, the relocation of the visitor center to provide more secure waiting and screening area, and securing air intakes to keep airborne contaminates out of the building.
The GAO report, however, said the FBI has not implemented all possible security countermeasures. It suggested the reasons were high cost and potential impact to operations, but the GAO points out that the FBI failed to provide historical documentation surrounding why those decisions were made. “While implementing recommended countermeasures may not always be feasible—because of physical limitations or budgetary restrictions, for example—the 2010 ISC standards require agencies to document any decision to reject or defer the countermeasures’ implementation, including whether the agency is willing to accept risk and whether there are any alternative strategies to meet the agency’s required level of protection.”
The larger question is whether the FBI will remain in the Hoover building. A 2008 GSA report called the building’s design “inefficient and functionally obsolete.” The GSA has spent $22 million to upgrade the building and its systems since 2004, but still estimates the building needs roughly $80.5 million in further repairs. These costs have been deferred until it’s determined whether the FBI will remain in the building or seek an alternative headquarters. The GAO report notes that any alternative “will take years to implement and is likely to cost over [sic] a billion dollars.
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