Susan Collins

But Mr. Metzler, you have an IG report that identifies 100 graves without the proper burial stone, that----

To help communities tap into that funding source, because for a community to have to spend tens of thousands of dollars to produce data to challenge these maps is really difficult during these tough economic times.

I feel so strongly that the financial burden of providing the data that would lead to the most accurate possible flood maps shouldn't fall on the communities. It should be FEMA's responsibility.

I support FEMA's efforts to modernize the outdated flood maps with new modeling and more detailed data.

That obviously is $26 million less. That is more than a 10 percent cut.

I would strongly encourage you and the Secretary to put your concerns in writing to Senators Dianne Feinstein and Christopher Bond.

I want to see specific action in that area as well.

The Department's budget request for the cybersecurity division for fiscal year 2011 is $19 million less than it was funded for this fiscal year.

I want to give you another example of an area that this Committee identified first in June 2008, again in 2009, and again, the two reports you have provided do not have any specifics for correcting the problems.

One of my frustrations with the Department and, frankly, with the Bottom-Up Review is that there are longstanding problems, which precede this Administration, that the Department still is not tackling and solving.

It is hard to imagine with so many that some of them were not, and I think we have to face that problem and deal with it so that the reality comes into conformance with the law.

Do you agree that the Department needs new authorities and resources to perform its cybersecurity mission?

I think that is absolutely the case, and you can save money and actually enhance efficiency if the agencies are co-located in many cases.

I think the Washington Post series has raised important questions about the big changes in our government since September 11, 2001.

I do believe that there are efficiencies and cost savings that can be achieved by consolidating some of the regional offices of DHS.

If you try to protect everything, you end up protecting nothing.

I was shocked to hear the number 200,000 contract employees that are working for the Department of Homeland Security.

The GAO first identified this necessity more than 7 years ago.

As the Senator knows, insurance companies are already heavily regulated by State regulators who impose their own, very different regulatory and capital requirements. The fact that those capital requirements are not the same as those…

Would the Senator agree that the council should not base designations simply on the size of the financial companies?

I ask the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, my colleague from Connecticut, Senator Dodd, to clarify the types of trust companies that fall within the scope of section 603(a), a provision that prohibits the Federal Deposit Insurance…

That those basic requirements were not identified before a single dollar was spent is something that I just cannot understand.

It is inconceivable to me that the Department is still putting plans and money into its budget justifications for a program that it had decided to abandon in December 2007.

There is no more alarming prospect than that of a nuclear September 11, 2001.

That is just extraordinary.