The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has thousands of pieces of security equipment worth nearly $200 million stored in a warehouse in Texas, most of it there for at least six months or longer and a third of it for over a year, according to a report released yesterday by the Republican staffs of two House committees.
The equipment, 5,700 pieces as of mid-February, includes 472 Advanced Technology 2 X-Ray systems used to screen carry-on bags at airports with 99 percent of the machines stored for at least nine months and 34 percent longer than a year, says the report, Airport Insecurity: TSA’s Failure to Cost-Effectively Procure, Deploy and Warehouse its Screening Technologies. The report was prepared by the majority staffs of the Transportation and Infrastructure and Oversight and Government Reform Committee.
The value of the stored equipment as of Feb. 15, 2012, was estimated at $184 million, the report says.
Since then, TSA has worked down somewhat the inventory at its Transportation Logistics Center (TLC) in Dallas, which serves as the storage center for equipment the agency plans to deploy, redeploy and dispose. At the end of March, the value of the stored equipment was $155 million, which represents 5 percent of the value of the entire agency’s security equipment, David Nicholson, assistant administrator for TSA’s Office of Finance and Administration, said at a joint hearing of the two committees regarding the equipment inventory.
Of the equipment at the TLC, Nicholson said that 80 percent has been stored for less than a year. A couple factors contribute to the inventory, he said, including purchasing equipment ahead of deployment so that airports can receive it when they are ready and also to align with the manufacturing schedules of suppliers.
Nicholson also said that TSA has brought down the annual operating costs of the TLC from $7.6 million in 2009 to $3.5 million in 2011 with further planned reductions ahead.
TSA in the past at times was inefficient in the deployment, redeployment and disposal of security equipment, Charles Edwards, the acting Inspector General at the Department of Homeland Security, said at the hearing. He noted that the agency had 345 new explosive trace detection (ETD) systems worth about $10.6 million that had been in storage at least one year and in some cases two years, because it didn’t have written plans for using the machines.
Edwards said that TSA for a long time lacked consistent plans for disposing of used equipment, noting that the agency began developing a plan in 2005 but didn’t begin disposing equipment until late 2008.
The IG in 2009 made three recommendations for TSA related to more efficient deployment, redeployment and disposal of equipment at the TLC, all of which the agency has taken action on, Edwards said.
Still, in their report the Republicans on the two committees remain concerned that TSA’s procurement practices remain subpar.
The report says the agency “knowingly” acquired more ETDs than necessary so that it could get a bulk discount, but as of mid-February nearly 1,500 of the units remained in storage.
“At approximately $30,000 per ETD, TSA’s purchases equate to nearly $44 million dollars in excessive quantities of ETD machines,” the report says. It adds that TSA officials couldn’t explain deployment plans for the machines.
Nicholson said that most of the ETDs are scheduled to be deployed in the current fiscal year.