Transcripts For CSPAN Capitol Police Chief Matthew Verderosa Testifies On Security Operations 20160523

Tonight on the communicators we broadcast from the conference in boston known as the internet and television expo. We interview f. C. C. Chair about the cable industry settop boxes and net neutrality. As you look at things, you see the evolution of the nature of television, the explosion of videos. You see increased talk about smaller bundles and how that changes the relationship with the consumer. You see alternative pathways to the consumer over influx kinds of devices. And that we have the potential be eentering the best era ever for consumers for programmers and for those who deliver. Tonight at 8 00 eastern on cspan 2. Now, the u. S. Capitol police chief testifies on threats to the capitol including past incidents and the Capitol Police response as well as security planning for Upcoming Events including the democratic and Republican National conventions. This is almost an hour. We might proceed. Were meeting today to hear from the new u. S. Capitol chief of police. As a committee we want to congratulate you on your appointment and we are looking forward to continuing to work with you. Some items we hope to discuss is the budget, priority, events, actions taken, as well as the initiative both current and future. The Capitol Police is a Law Enforcement agency with a very unique mission charged with protecting and serving the u. S. Capitol the seat of our nations democracy. This is an institution physical symbols of our free society. Unfortunately our institution of freedom and democracy also is a target. So there will be need on restrictions but a complete ban will be detrimental to the institution. The American People need to access and meet with members of congress. Since congress created the police they have worked very hard to fill in dual mission of safety and accessibility. Each of us have the utmost respect for the men and women who serve and protect our nations capitol. Were holding the hearing as part of our responsibility for oversight. Our last hearing was in may of 2015 and today the committee will hear from the new chief on the progress thats been made, his vision to continue to develop the force. Our committee of course works with the Capitol Police on a daily basis to ensure they have he tools they need to keep our capitol safe for all. They are responsibility to ensure that the protocols are tested and deployed against any threats we might face. As with any Law Enforcement organization the responsibility for meeting the Mission Begins and ends at the top. The chief understands the security needs of the capitol complex. The chief has served in a number of roles since 1986 has seen firsthand how new and variable threats have increased. While there are some sensitive aspects about the operations and capabilities there certainly are a number of items we would like to discuss and receive an update as well. Certainly about some of the various incidents that have happened. I know we have had an opportunity to talk i think privately with all the members here about the shooting incident that occurred at the visitors center. That i will just say before you an get a chance, your staff, the Capitol Police, that happened by the book. They did such a fantastic job of reacting and responding. You could write a book. That was perfect, the response. As well, we had all these protests that happened recently here. We might like to hear about when you were processing such large number of arrests how that all went, Lessons Learned for that. Also, about your Leadership Team, how your strategic plan, your goals and objectives, training, monitoring threats across the campus as well, weve talked a little bit about garage security. I dont know if you want to touch on that today. Thats always an issue, something we all met about again recently. And i know youve met with many members about that as well as our sergeant at arms very, very involved in that as well. So i will also say before i ask my Ranking Member to make a comment, i think since the gyro copter incident, we have all seen as members of congress here an increased amount of communication from the u. S. Capitol police on various incidents. In fact, we probably get almost more information than we need sometimes. But more is better. So im certainly very appreciative of that. I dont think any member wants to be in a position where were watching something unfold on the capitol lawn whether on fox news or cnn or whatever youre watching. So that i think is very much appreciated as well. So this committee of course is here to assist the Capitol Police because we all share a common goal and thats protecting the u. S. Capitol campus and everyone who works here and the millions of visitors who come here each and every year. So we thank you for your appearance. We look forward to your testimony. I recognize my Ranking Member for his Opening Statement. Thank you for holding this very important hearing this morning. Good to see you. Thank you for being here. I have a longer statement for the record but i want to comment briefly and thank the chief for how visible he has been. Your predecessor was here 31 2 years. I think i met him one time toward the end of his tenure. Ive been here three months and ive met with you four times. I appreciate that. I know how hard your job can be and ive heard about a positive tone and my staff advise me that we are working very well together. So thank you for that. I also thank you for traveling to philadelphia and for taking the time to meet to talk about congressional security at the convention. I would like to mention for the benefited of my republican colleagues that our Security Professionals are very impressed with our chief and sergeant at arms. Again you show the proper respect to all our members and we appreciate you. So that will speak very well for you in your convention in cleveland also. Thank you for your service. I look forward to hearing from you. I think both of those conventions are going to go absolutely smooth. Right . Any other member wish to make an Opening Statement or comment . Let me formally introduce the chief. On march 21, 2016, the chief was sworn . As the new chief. The ninth chief, has been serving as assistant since april 2015. The chief has served in numerous roles including positions in the uniformed and patrol division, internal affairs division, the training and services bureau. In addition he command it had u. S. Capitol polices review task force before becoming assistant chief. As chief he is responsible for commanding a force of sworn and civilian personnel who are dedicated to providing comprehensive Law Enforcement security and protection. Members staff and millions of visitors as well and to the surrounding complex. We thank you for joining us. We have your written testimony. You can the floor is yours. Take as much time as you need. Thank you maam i certainly appreciate the opportunity to be here. Good morning members and thank you for the opportunity to appear before the committee to discuss the United States Capitol Police. I am here today by the departments chief Administrative Officer mr. Ichard brad doc, and also depp chiefs deputy chief. Who is staffing watching operations. Also with me is our general counsel. And members representatives from the Departments Office of Inspector General. Also i would like to welcome other members of my executive Management Team and i appreciate their presence here today. The fop chairman and the vice chairman. Also with us are members of the team sters, our other union who we work with on a daily basis. I would thank the committee for their sted fast support. The regular discussions that we have with you and your staff about our programs and management of our mission are greatly valued and im very grateful for the committees feedback so we meet the needs and expectations of congress. Secondly i would like to recognize the men and women of the United States Capitol Police. Every day they publicly demonstrate how american freedoms that we all hold dear are carried out in our nations capitol. They work tirelessly to ensure that the congress can conduct its legislative responsibilities without disruption. All the while exhibiting the utmost respect for the constitution and the protection of First Amendment liberties. I am thoroughly impressed with their performance of which is both seen and unseen by the public and the community. And i am thankful for their desire to constantly rise to the occasion and handle whatever comes our way. I have been in federal Law Enforcement for over 30 years serving in a number of roles and now as chief of the u. S. Capitol police i have the responsibility to you, to the members of congress, Capitol Police board, the congressional staff, the visitors and my employees to do Everything Possible to protect and safeguard everyone everyday in a unique and open environment. The threats and risk wes face today are dynamic, theyre changing, theyre sophisticated. And they create a greater need to focus on national security. Coordinating with the Capitol Police board and consulting with our can hes of just diagnose including this committee we have developed a fouryear strategy that provides for growth of the department to fulfill thre new mission sets. In an effort to further enhance the successful longterl protection of the capitol complex. These are the result of a constant threat analysis, including intelligence gathered globally and nationally. These initiatives consist of enhanced garage security, prescreeners, and additional overwatch personnel at various Building Access points. Also, the further use of the enhanced portal screeners that weve employed for the first time during the state of the union. Members and staff will see several enhabsments as a result of the three initiatives. There will be a visible security screening at house garage entry points and a more significant officer presence outside the capitol complex doors and access points, including additional k9 teams and subject interdiction officers. Visitors entering the House Chamber will undergo additional screening through enhanced portal scanners. Further keeping potential threats away from the house of representatives and the floor of the house. There has been much discussion regarding resources for the department and the longterm viability of these initiatives as the chief of police and as the steward of the taxpayers dollars its hi responsibility to look at every possibility within existing assets to accomplish our mission before i seek additional assets and resources. The congress has been very generous to the department and i will do my Due Diligence to first look within and not request something that unless it is truly needed. One of the tough decisions ive had to make to meet the new mission sets within our current resources is to find staffing o accomplish some of the additional screening requirements within our existing budget. To do this and after discussing my concept with chairman of the fop labor committee, i have determined that it is most appropriate to modify some of our offpost time rotations in the Uniformed Services bureau from the current standard of a onetofour rotations to a onetofive during shifts when a majority of the officers are working monday through friday day and evenings. This will make additional man prour available and will result in only approximately ten minutes less off post time or standby time for employees. While these with these enhancements come important opportunities. The modification of offpost rote yailingses will result in more special Job Opportunities for employee thrussout the department. Specifically in the area of k9 and subject interdiction. These will provide Police Coverage and zones at outside access points. This is not only the longstanding contractual obligations with our cba and the off post time remains well above the minimum required for the collective Bargaining Agreement allowing for appropriate relief time for officers who routinely are focused on working the security equipment. With some Additional Resources they will be necessary in the outyears to complete the initiatives and to provide stationary posts. I am confident of the ability to meet these new mission sets and we will continue to look for ways to offset any costs and expenses potential reapportionment of how we assign personnel. In the months ahead we have a number of high profile protective events that will require much attention and man power resources. Later this month the annual memorial day rehearsal and concert will take place followed by the fourth of July Celebration on the west front of the capitol. In july the department will also be focusing its attention on the two president ial nominating conventions in cleveland, ohio, and philadelphia, pennsylvania. Where we will be protecting members of congress. In addition, we are officially planning the 58th inaugural of the president of the United States which takes place on january 20, 2017. While this National Special security event takes place on Capitol Grounds every four years its prudent and necessary to begin preparations early enough to ensure absolute success in the execution of the significant mission set. As former commander of the departments policy and planning operations, i fully understand the importance of setting meaningful performance metrics focused on outcomes rather than outputs. We are currently in the process of building the foundation to better collect analyze and share the data that we collect departmentwide with the ultimate goal of having information that allows my staff to better to be better informed and making management and security decisions. The department is also actively engaged in addressing and resolving recommendations made by the office of Inspector General. Since 2006 the Inspector General has made 310 recommendations to the department. We have closed 255 by fully implementing the recommendations. Were actively working obclosing the remaining 55 open recommendations and annually i will continue to propose key areas for the Inspector General to examine so that she and her team can assist me in making needed changes that will make us a better department. In closing i want to share with you some of my priorities for the near term. You have always believed the departments mission is simple yet creamly critical. I want to get back to the basics and not overcomplicate policing. I want to leverage resources to become smarter and more espisht especially in the area of intelligence gathering. Place a greater effort on training to fight complacency and to ensure that supervisors are prepared to manage. These are the basic areas that i will focus on during the next year. Finally i think it is important to discuss and mention the march 28, 2016 shooting incident in the u. S. Capitol visitors center. From all practical perspectives i want to say the screening process works. We had on that day we had an individual intent on wreaking havoc. He was detected to be carrying a weapon during the process we employ each day to screen people visiting the capitol complex. We were prepared, we responded appropriately. And should serve as a lesson to other whose may want to come to the hill to do harm. Highly trained officer will stop those individuals who wish to do us harm. I am extremely proud of the officers involved in this incident and i am grateful to our Partner Agencies for their assistance both throughout the event and following the incident. Again, thank you for opportunity to testify here today about the United States Capitol Police. I am truly humbled to be here. And i would be pleased to answer any questions you have. Thank you very much, chief. I would ask, we mentioned about better communication from the u. S. Capitol police to all the members of congress. But if you could perhaps expand on that a bit of how your agency communicates and how you work with your brother agencies here locally. For instance, when we had the navy yard incident and just communicating with d. C. Police or other agencies as well. How was that all working . Certainly. We have a very Good Relationship with our Partner Agencies here in d. C. Particularly the metropolitan police, the United States park police, the United States secret service, federal protective service, Supreme Court police. We have communications Interoperable Communications with our Partner Agencies. We have a direct switch line to the secret service the metropolitan police the park police. We work very closely with were embedd with several jptf, task forces, the and we have an ongoing relationship with the Supreme Court and the federal protective service. And they actually man our command center on a regular basis, on a daily basis so that we have direct communications. We also work with other agencies on an ad hoc basis. We have Interoperable Radio Communications with most of the local agencies and were working to solidify further the ability to communicate directly from a command perspective. We meet regularly with the metropolitan police and their Law Enforcement partners meeting every monday. I attend various meetings as do my subordinate officials at a multitude of levels on a multitude of issues regarding the ongoing Law Enforcement issues threats and eevebts that are occurring throughout the district of columbia. We certainly have Lessons Learned from all of these major events including the navy yard, the second navy yard incident, and the difference between the first and second in terms of communication was extreme. Incident command as a matter of fact deputy chief rogers was Incident Commander for the command post representative for the United States Capitol Police during that second ongoing navy yard issue. So we have we all employ incident command system processes for leadership and command area command and we communicate on a regular and daily basis during events and uring the off times. The gyro copter incident was communication with the community. We have improved our messaging matrix and i apologize if we give you too much. Id rather you have too much than too long. Its important that you know whats going on for Situational Awareness and for the effect that incidents have on the legislative process. We take Great Strides to make sure that you have the information that you need both on the house side and the senate side. We are looking we shortly will have a joint congressional messaging process as being worked on jointly with all the stakeholders and i look forward to that. So that will cut out some of the if there is delay it will certainly cut out redundancy and it will be more efficient. If i could ask one other question. I appreciate the answer to the first one. We talk about investment yt u. S. Capitol police and certainly theres no second for investing in people and all kinds of technology that can assist you resourcing you properly. The k9s are unbelievable. What a critical component. Those dogs can find thing that is no computer can it seems like. Absolutely. How do you deal with the k9s do you need more of them . How do you see that unfolding . We are expanding our k9 capability by six dogs in the near term. Art of that is the traditional eod type sweeps and we have some other new techniques that we use which i would be happy to discuss off line which will just contribute to being a force multiplier for us. In terms of what we do. Absolutely the dogs are invaluable. They can do many thing that is humans cant. They detect things at long distances they can detect thing that is we obviously would not know were there. So we do literally hundreds of thousands of sweeps every year with the dogs. And again theyre invaluable to us. We have a very we currently have an opening and we get tremendous competition for the openings in the k9 unit. Its truly incredible. Thank you very much. I recognize our Ranking Member mr. Brady. Thank you. Chief as you know i do represent philadelphia and thank you for your visit where the Democratic National convention will take place. But discuss your preparations from the Capitol Police perspective not only in philadelphia but also in cleveland, what preparations are there. Absolutely. Our Convention Planning is well under way. Weve been working our dignitary protection has the lead. They employ the secret service is the lead planner for both events, both in philadelphia and in cleveland. S part of the broad approach and committee approach, weve planned these we plan these events within that framework. So we have employed the framework for any number of major events including previous conventions, state of the union addresses, and the naugrals. And its really a sound system that we cover all bases. Our Dignitary Protection Division has made multiple visits to both venues both cities. Theyve procured the requisite lodging. And we are in the process of designing security plan for the specific venues both the actual Convention Venues and any answer larry venues that for events that are occurring outside the main venue. I appreciate the opportunity to travel to philadelphia and meet with you. And i appreciate the introduction that you gave us to the philadelphia officials that helped me tremendously in my ability to communicate the message to my troops and to make sure that were doing all the thing that is we need to do. E are going to be traveling to either myself or representatives along with the house sergeant at arms to cleveland in the very near future just as we did in the philadelphia trip. We will continue to work with our Law Enforcement partners both state local and federal to ensure that the security plan for the member protection and thats the reason were going to be there to make sure that the members of congress have a safe event and we can protect the interests of our statutory protectees. We will continue to regularly brief the Capitol Police board and my staff is available to brief the committee at your request on the status of the planning. Thank you, chief. Also, it goes without saying, the people you brought here you were having a pretty Good Relationship with the other unions the teamsters and the police unions. And i also know because theyre not knocking down my door and have been for the last three years every other month coming in trying to complain about how we can be helpful. Thats not happening. So how often do you meet with your reps . Its about every two weeks. But in between, his staff and my staff are working on issues. The former House Administration is my chief of staff and he works directly with jim on a number of issues. I meet on a number of issues, whether its contract negotiations or just daily issues. The philosophy for me and ive known the chairman and gus for many years, particularly jim for almost 30 years and we have a Mutual Respect for each others positions. Ive asked jim to be here today and i appreciate his attendance. Since i was appointed we instituted the regular meetings. I plan on continuing the regular meetings. We also believe i think we both believe that theres significant Common Ground that we can address issues, try to resolve issues at the lowest level before they become grievances. And we work on things of mutual interest. Of course we will probably disagree on some issues. But i think we have the kind of relationship that well be able to work through those issues in an amicable way and try to do whats best for the congress. Thank you chief and thank the men for the job you do every single way. Its a pleasure to be working with you. Madam chair, i yield back the balance of my time. Mr. Harper is recognized. Thank you. And chief thank you for being here. I know this has been a very sobering weekend with Memorial Service that was sunday and how that i know means so much to you and your attendance we greatly appreciate. Last week the house passed some important bills, one of which was the fundable vest program to help local Law Enforcement with that lifesaving bullet proof vest to help on those funding issues there. And i know you and i had an opportunity to meet. I thank you for coming to my office and for us having that opportunity. As i told you, if i had an issue or problem im going to come to you and well discuss it. I wont be running to the press to talk about it. You and i will have a chance to do that and i want to reiterate that here. But what can we do as a committee and as individual members of congress to help you do your job . And im not talking about the funding issues. Sure. What else can we do . Thank you for meeting with me both privately and for your comments today, sir. I appreciate the committees support and on initiatives on whether its garage security or port al scanners or any of the when issues that come up, its interesting, because its such a large institution. And i have a very large workforce. Sometimes it takes a little while for information to filter down. Were working on the communication piece. But its also incumbent on us to assist the sergeant at arms on both sides and the leadership to communicate the message of any changes that we do. Come easy m co for people. I know, i have a 24yearold its hard to change anything without an argument or a reason. I have to explain my reasoning. And i try to do that because its the right thing to do. I want to be able to communicate changes. And thats one of the reason that is i do meet with the union leadership. I want to have that open communication. But i also want to have that with the community. To i intend to continue visit member offices and try to advise you all everybody in both on the committee and off on what were doing and why we do things. Because i think if you have the information it helps sell the message and it helps us change sort of the mindset wlrks were going to Institute New operations or new procedures. So i appreciate the opportunity to be able to come to the members and be able to explain why we do things. I think its important to maintain that communication. Chief, firearms qualifications, certifications are very important. I know were in an interim here with the range being out of place. Tell me what youre doing in the interim and how the new facility will be an improvement over the old. I appreciate the question, sir. We are in our current cycle even though were off site in the interim while our range is down and were preparing for tree opening of the new range, i want to thank the congress and the architect for providing the funds and the space and the ability to have a range that is so close to where we work. What it does for us is it helps us minimize the impact of having our sworn workforce off the grounds in a status thats either not working or in training. Its travel time. It really helps us to have the range here. We have the old range in the rayburn for over 50 years. And we got tremendous amount of use out of the range and i couldnt even quantify how much time and effort we saved by having the range locally. Our goal is to have the new range open up soon by labor day and have it in use for at least another 50 years. It will certainly outlast me. But so far in this cycle we have qualified 87 of the police department. Now, weve reaped some benefit even though theres a little bit of cost associated with sending them out to maryland where our Entry Level Academy is. We have maximized the use of that time by continuing the training day. So we send officers out for the entire day rather than having them traveling back to the hill. So we leveraged the ability to use some more of our training time during that extra day. I look forward to having the range back here on the hill though as you can see we probably will be able to finish our current cycle by june 1st hopefully if not sometime in june and then well move on the to the second. We have semiannual yull qualifications so we shoot twice a year in the fiscal year and we are a little bit off the cycle however with the indulgence of stakeholders we have a great plan to get the range up and running and it will really provide us with the opportunity to change how we train. Its a dynamic range and its helpful for us to tactically use a range. Thank you, chief. And i yield back. The chair recognizes ms. Lofgren. Thanks very much. And welcome to you, chief. Its good to meet you. Im hoping that at some point we can have a closed session with the chief, because theres some questions that probably wouldnt be smart to ask in a public environment. But that we should get the answers to. Just two things. I was concerned in discussing this with the prior chief that although there was communication with other Law Enforcement agencies, there didnt appear to be a written mutual aid protocol. And so im interested in not going through it today but in reviewing that with you in terms of the protocol what it is and how its communicated to our workforce number one. And number two, im wondering if the department has ideas on how the physical layout of the plant might the campus might be adjusted to enhance safety nd also to enhance the capacity of your members to do their job. Certainly the physical security is one of our main issues. We have a very robust physical security. Security services bureau. And they handle all the physical security aspects working very closely with the architect of the capitol. The measures that were put in place post 9 11 have really we are at the life cycle end of a lot of the life. Were looking at doing life cycle replacement. Of course so always a very expensive issue but its certainly something that is very necessary. Let me interrupt because i dont think i was clear on my question. For example, where is the perimeter . We ant really i mean, respect the fourth amendment. You have to have a rationale for inquiring. But at the perimeter of the facility you dont. So where are the perimeters set and how should they be set . How would that make a difference for your troops in terms of level of securities and garages we have garages that have nothing above them, we have garages that have an Office Building above them. What kind of deployment makes sense in each one. Those are the things i was thinking of. Sure. Absolutely. Of course we always balance the open campus with the level of security that we provide. And its very important to maintain, and its very difficult. Youre absolutely right. Its a very difficult balance for our officers. We dont have a physical fence. We dont have structures that prevent people from walking across the east front west front. We use our human intuitive capability and we deploy personnel. Obviously within the framework of the infrastructure. Whether its the omested wall or physical barriers that we install, barriers that pop up for vehicular threats and those types of things. We have to be obviously very cognizant of the effect that security has on the openness and the ability for constituents to visit members. Of course. And its a very huge competing interest in the security issue. O we focus our main thrust and concentration on the largest threats and were always looking for the individual threats. Which is one of the greatest threats that we have these days. The individual. But we have to balance it and accept a modicum of risk in terms of the physical structures that we put in to prevent people from approaching the building we do work with very closely with both this committee and the senate rules committee, committee on rules and administration. So to work on those issues, whether its expanding the perimeter, allowing access close into the building, or whether its initiatives to do inspection of thing that is people bring with them to the grounds. So its a very tenuous line that we walk and we take it very very hard look at any type of procedure were going to employ that could come close to to be perceived as a violation of the fourth amendment. We certainly dont want to do anything that would be contrary to the constitution. So its a work in progress. We work on it continually. Its a conversation that i have with the Capitol Police board on a regular basis. And we will continue to have with the committees of jurisdiction. I see my time has expired. Perhaps we can pursue this further. Absolutely. Thank you. I appreciate you holding this. Chief, welcome. Thank you, sir. And i appreciate your time when you came up to visit with me in the office. What a different approach. I will just say this. And i am not blowing smoke. But what a different approach with regards to your approach and prior chief with inclusion the union, in a weekly or whatever its necessary discussion. Typically youre going to probably agree on more things than youre going to disagree. Youre always going to have disagreement. It happens in the best of families. But at the end of the day, you know, the rank and file folks out there doing the job every day have some great ideas. And i think that your moving absolutely in the right direction and i think well be much safer as members of congress because of that collaboration between the two groups. Know, he things you that still strikes me when we go back and loost at past history and we had the chief here discuss that, particularly when we had loss of weapons and things like that. But reading an article where the person who sent the picture got how many months off without pay and demoated. And the person who actually left the weapon unattended in a location that could be accessed by other folks received a suspension but relatively minor in scope. And i guess im still a little miffed at the fact that that supervisor got demoted but suspension d a huge without pay. And i understand some litigation so you probably cant talk about it. But i would hope in the future that what that person did is actually brought out in issue that needed to be under the light of day. So we all know. And we all take confidence in what goes on within the Capitol Police. And i will go along with mr. Brady on this. Ive not had any negative comments with the union at all, which is thats a testament to your leadership. I will just be very blunt with that. A testament to your leadership. And i hope that continues. One of the things i know we talked about was management, by walking around. Walking around your organization and listening to the folks that youre only as good as the people you surround yourself with. And i would suggest that your Leadership Team do the same and i am sure they are under your leadership. One of the things ms. Love grep had mentioned is security. And i think thats an issue that we all grapple with from time to time and youre right we have an open campus. But what exactly as we move forward in regards to the underground facilities, i know that were the econgresswomens in place. When are we actually going to start to do that screening . We will be doing the security screening with the appropriate communication first. Very soon. I cant give you a specific date. Im working with the sergeant at arms and we want to time it right so that we introduce the screening process. I know that people weve had some Community Meetings with the staff several weeks ago in terms of how we would roll it out. And im working very closely with mr. Irving on exactly when we want to do it strategically so we cause the least amount of disruption to the business process of the community or the community. But i would expect sometime in the next several weeks that well do it. And well certainly communicate it. I got that message loud and clear. Make sure everyone is aware of what were going to do. I appreciate your comments about working with the union, sir. I respect the troops. I consider myself first and foremost a Police Officer and im prepared every time im out on the street to take Police Action. I carey i dont have it today because im wearing this blouse but i carry my radio er day, i monitor the radio. And i take Police Action when i need to. And i have tremendous respect for the work that we do here. I ask a lot of the troops. They are ambassadors. They still have to enforce the rules and the law and they deal with 10 to 12 Million People a year. And thats just screening them through the process. Theres probably another 10 million who walk through the grounds that we do. We talk to we interact with. And im always amazed at how few complaints that we get from the citizens and the staff about courtesy or those types of things. You know, they truly are ambassadors. They do hard work. Theyre focused on the xray machines and the mag tom ters. And knowing that every time they have to be 100 , they have to be sharp. So i appreciate members of both unions being here today and i appreciate the relationship i have with the officers. I always work to have a positive relationship. Obviously there are things we have to disagree on and i have to make tough decisions and tough choices that affect people. But i never fall short of understanding that these are people. Theyre not numbers. They have families, they have ambition, they have interests. And to me, i try to treat people the way i want to be treated. Im not making a moral judgment on any previous chief or anything else. Its just my approach to how i ork with my my staff. And i have leaders and deputy chiefs and civilian directors who are out with the troops and i appreciate that comment as well because theyre good role models. Theyre out amongst their troops. Again we make management decisions and theyre tough decisions and not everyone agrees on the best approach to how we get to that bottom line but the officers are a great resource. A great example of that is rocessing the 1300 or so arrests that we had a couple weeks ago during the democracy spring demonstration period. Now, this was nonviolent civil disobedience. It was nonconfrontational for the most part. And it took a lot of planning and effort and a lot of man power. Its not me making the arrests. Its the officers that come in early, its the officers that have to be the arresting officer. And its the people who do the job that i respect. I have so much respect for. Because really ive worked the posts and ive done those jobs. And its on a sunday sometimes you have to come in wake up early and youd rather be doing something else. But its why we get paid the big bucks and they do a tremendous job. But we took a concept and a new approach for how we handled mass arrests. Other agencies in the city have had the ability to cite and release people. Traditionally here with the way the rules are set up and the laws, weve had to have full custody arrests for most of the arrestees that we handle. Even in mass arrests civil disoid obedience. Its massive in time and effort. These are the same troops that had to go day to day and be the same people brought in early to handle these arrests. So we took a concept that i thought could be employed. We borrowed and adapted the metropolitan polices pd61 d cite and release forms. Their policy. We adapted them to ours. We worked with the attorney general for the district of columbia to make sure that we were using the appropriate charges. And when the law changed in 2013 it made it easier for us to use this process. So we employed it. And we were able to expedite the process. But the reason i bring this up is it really wasnt it wasnt me. I had the concept but the officers are the ones who took even from the first day we had arrests it took about 8 hours to process 429 people. It doesnt seem like a lot of time but when you look at how we would still probably be processing these arrests had we been using the old method the old mass arrest method. In that short durition of one week, the officers came up with a great idea and with a couple of the lieutenants who were running the mission set, and expedited the process. By the end of that week, we processed 300 arrests in three hours, which is just phenomenal. And we had very few issues. And we will further refine the process based on the suggestions of the officers. So i agree with you that some of the best ideas come up from the ranks and rise through the ranks. So im very appreciative of the effort of everybody on the cdu, civil disturbance unit. Switching gears on you for one second. And yes, the case in the paper is in litigation. I would prefer not to talk about it. The individual was on administrative leave with pay, not without pay. For that period of time. Set the record straight on that. Thanks for your indulgence. Maybe you ought to talk to your counterpart in the t. S. A. In regards to listening to people that work there. Thank you. Mr. Parker. Thank you very much for the opportunity to ask a few questions. I would linchinge to thank you once again for meeting with me in my office let me know what youre doing and planning to do. That was very helpful. Thank you. Secondly, you werent here earlier but i thanked the Capitol Police. I think youve been doing a terrific job and i appreciate that. I did want to mention one incident that we had here. A colleague of ours fell hard during one of the snow storms and hurt himself. He was found by another colleague of ours who then quickly got a couple of Police Officers here, Capitol Police to bring him inside and they were very smart to figure out that he had some chest pains and didnt walk away as he wanted to walk away. And they called the medics and got the medical response to team to come and and we would have probably allowed him to walk away and that would have been a bad idea. So i think the police did a fantastic job and i want to thank them for that. Doy want to ask a little bit about the issue of the open campus. Ive been to germany and they do put a fence around its very difficult to access it. We see more and more they have a double fence over around the front of the white house. Obviously that gives you a lot of protection but it also prevents people from actually access the white house which at one point they had access to. So there is a balance there. And i think it is important to give people the opportunity to come and visit their members of congress and the senate. But it is also interesting the issue of security. Not so much even for us but for those people who do come visit us. I appreciate you said you give that a lot of thought. Could you comment a little more on that . Sure. We do try to Leverage Technology to the exat the present time that we can. And believe me, again the force multiplier technology, the system some of the systems that i prefer not to talk about in an open forum but theyre there for us to use and we do use them. And we deploy them very effectively. I think as technology increases and the quality of the technology, i think well be able to leverage that. Obviously theres no replacement for having an officer on the beat on a fixed post or in a patrol area that will focus on the security particularly closed in. We take sort of a layered approach. We want to keep the threat as far away as we can to push it out. And as you get closer to the consentric closer you want to have your assets. We do leverage even the physical security aspects where we have barriers and key of courses we have posts staffed and we use the buildings as sort of funnels and we can keep eyes on people and individuals who approach from the various directions. But again we never want to trample on the ability for people to visit. m not advocating putting up a fence oring in like that. I think with our troops and a focus and an approach where we maintain our vigilance in terms of looking at the threat, training our employees to what to look for, and being able to make sure that the troops are fresh and they are able to react appropriately, i think with training and staffing that combination along with the physical security attributes that we have weve been provided with to protect the campus, i think that the ongoing conversation will continue with the Capitol Police board and with the committees to ensure that we have all the thing that is we need, particularly technologically, that will help us and assist us so that we can leverage that without sort of closing the campus off. So i know that its sort of a work in progress, the Technology Changes every day. We want to be able to stay ahead of the curve and we want to keep our finger on the pulse in terms of whats available to us to sort of use as a leverage as a force multiplier. Thank you very much. And i know my time is about up but i would like to say this. Even though they do monitor the threat theyre very polite and professional too. I appreciate that. I know ive commented on a couple of people in particular and i appreciate their professionalism. I thank the gentleman. And again we just want to thank you so much for coming today. We all are very desire yuss of looking forward to working with you shoulder to shoulder not just you but your Management Team. And all the rank and file. The Union Fellows that are here representing all the rank and files. And just know we appreciate it. Every one of us is coming into these offices and these Office Buildings the capitol every day. We watch your folks day in and day out. And they do their job so professionally and bravely and well. We all have a very high degree of comfort and security about the professionalism of the bray men and women of the u. S. Capitol police force. In this committee stands by to assist you and one thing i would say and i know ive said this to you privately. Ill say it publicly as well. Dont sometimes wait for a hearing or wait for us to come forward with something. We really want to know from you if theres a shortfall somewhere that you see as a particularly critical element or something that wed better be aware of, we need to help with. Thats why were here. We all work together. I sincerely appreciate the support and how cooperative the staff has been with me, when i want to bring forward, if i want to come meet with the members. I really sincerely appreciate the opportunity to be here today. Thank you very much. Thank you. Without objection all members will have 5 legislative days to submit additional written questions for the witness if we have any and well forward them ask the chief to respond so any answers can be made part of the record. Without objection this hearing is adjourned. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions Copyright National able satellite corp. 2016] captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption contents and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org this week on q a vanity fair columnist mic