Federal Insider: DHS report cites dangers in federal police hiring delays

The latest installment in the ongoing saga of federal workforce hiring problems comes from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

The department’s three largest law enforcement organizations (Customs and Border Protection, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Secret Service) are close to authorized strength, but that masks a serious issue: substantial delays in hiring.

Those delays are documented in a new report from the department’s Office of Inspector General (IG).

“The inability to hire law enforcement personnel in a timely manner may lead to shortfalls in staffing, which can affect workforce productivity and morale, as well as potentially disrupt mission critical operations,” said the report dated Oct. 31.

Data in the report indicate the days from job announcement to hire ranged from seven months to a year in fiscal 2015, depending on the agency. As bad as that might seem, in most cases the time to hire is better now than before.

For example, among the three law enforcement agencies, ICE deportation officers had the shortest time to hire, 212 days. That’s a major improvement from the 1,161 days — more than three years — in 2012. Unfortunately, the Secret Service Uniformed Division is going backward. It took 272 days to hire in 2014. That jumped to 359, a 32 percent increase, in one year.

DHS agreed with the inspector general’s five recommendations.

“As noted in the Inspector General’s report, DHS has taken a range of steps to reduce the time it takes to hire law enforcement personnel …” Neema Hakim, a department spokesman said by email. “DHS has been undertaking a Department-wide initiative to streamline and improve hiring processes, which has included collecting more information on hiring, automating the process where appropriate, and increasing the number of human resources support staff.”

Recruitment events, allowing an applicant to complete several hiring steps, including polygraph testing, at one location, have significantly reduced hiring time, Hakim added. In the case of a Secret Service Uniformed Division “all-inclusive hiring events” cut time to hire by almost 30 percent. “CBP’s expedited hiring events have decreased time-to-hire for qualified applicants by 63 percent,” Hakim said.

The IG studied the department’s hiring problems at the request of the Senate and House Appropriations Committees.

“Chronic and systemic personnel shortfalls and lengthy hiring times jeopardize DHS’s homeland security mission,” said a 2015 House report on the DHS appropriation bill. “To stem skyrocketing attrition and hiring shortfalls,” the House committee directed the department to develop a corrective action plan based on a “root cause analysis.”

One cause is insufficient staff needed to process new personnel.

“At the Secret Service, for example, the lack of staff has affected completion of polygraph examinations and background investigations of applicants,” according to the IG report. “Special Agents in field offices conduct polygraph examinations and background investigations as collateral duties. Officials explained it is difficult for these Special Agents to complete these collateral duties because their primary investigative and protective functions take precedence.”