The House Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday approved legislation requiring the Homeland Security Department’s Domestic Nuclear Detection Office (DNDO) to prepare documentation laying out the rationale for its research and development spending.
The DHS branch is tasked with working with domestic and international partners to strengthen detect, prevent, respond to, and identify the culprits in an attack involving nuclear or radiological materials. Its funding for the current budget year is just over $347 million.
Speaking at a committee markup session, bill sponsor Rep. Cedric Richmond (D-La.) noted a recent Government Accountability Office report that he said found that improved documentation would strengthen the efficacy of DNDO’s transformational and applied research directorate. The review determined that DNDO needed to better show more transparently how research and development projects are selected for funding, Richmond said.
“Without documentation explaining how research and development projects align with research challenges, it is hard to determine whether DNDO research investments are positioned to address identified gaps in the global nuclear detection architecture,” he said. “It is my understanding that DNDO has agreed with the GAO findings and undertaken steps to correct this need a create a path forward. Enactment of H.R. 5391 will make sure that DNDO takes a systematic approach for evaluating, prioritizing, and selecting research topics.”
The bill would specifically add language to the Homeland Security Act of 2002 requiring DNDO to: “develop and maintain documentation, such as a technology roadmap and strategy” that would provide data on how its research spending aligns with identified nuclear detection gaps globally and research challenges identified by the office’s director; show how research areas are selected and prioritized; and establish a method for determining how research outcomes support DNDO’s research challenges.
The committee approved the bill on a voice vote without amendments, sending it to the full House for consideration.
