By Ann Roosevelt
Creation of a Council of Governors and more discussion are needed before before the Secretary of Defense is granted more authority over reserve forces in responding to domestic emergencies, the National Governor’s Association (NGA) writes to congressional defense leaders.
“Your support in ensuring the Council of Governors is quickly established would help facilitate the dialogue that must take place before any legislation regarding these issues moves forward,” write NGA Chairman Vermont Gov. James Douglas (R), and NGA Vice Chair West Virginia Governor Joe Manchin (D) in an Aug. 20 letter to the chairman and ranking member of both the Senate and House Armed Services Committees.
“We’ve encouraged DoD and the Administration to establish the Council of Governors to facilitate consultation and coordination between the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of Homeland Security, and governors on issues critical to homeland defense and emergency response,” it said.
The governors oppose efforts by DoD to add language to the Fiscal Year 2010 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) giving the Secretary of Defense “expanded authorities” in assisting in domestic disaster responses.
DoD has asked Congress to authorize the Defense Secretary to “order reserve forces to active duty to assist in disaster response as part of the NDAA conference agreement for Fiscal Year 2010,” the NGA letter states.
Both the House and Senate have passed their versions of the defense-authorization bill and such language would have to be added by conference committee members. A final bill is expected to be sent to the White House this fall.
The governor’s concern centers on proposed changes to the military’s authority to engage independently in domestic emergency response situations.
“We strongly believe the consideration of any such proposals should be preceded by a discussion regarding the tactical control of forces serving inside a state during a disaster response, Douglas and Manchin write.
A similar provision was part of last year’s House version of the bill, but removed in conference over governor’s concerns. The Joint Explanatory Statement accompanying the bill made it clear that DoD should address those concerns with the governors before moving ahead with the proposal.
“The Department of Defense should engage with the community of governors to work out an understanding of unity of effort during domestic terrorist events and public emergencies. This key underlying issue must be addressed to allow this and other promising proposals to be enacted,” it said.
Recent DoD outreach to correspond with the governors is “not sufficient to engender governors’ support or justify moving ahead with the proposal at this time,” the governors wrote.
The governors do welcome the opportunity to work with DoD to discuss “unity of effort and tactical control during disasters and to identify legislative and operational opportunities to improve governors’ responses,” they write, and have said so in a letter recently sent to Paul Stockton, assistant secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense and Americas’ Security Affairs.
However, they said, such discussions should not be done in haste and should address concerns and create understanding between governors and DoD, and held in an appropriate forum, such as the congressionally-created Council of Governors called for as part of the NDAA in FY ’08.