Page 1 GAO-24-107251 DHS Priority Recommendations
Comptroller General
of the United States
August 19, 2024
The Honorable Alejandro Mayorkas
Secretary of Homeland Security
Washington, D.C. 20528
Priority Open Recommendations: Department of Homeland Security
Dear Secretary Mayorkas:
The purpose of this letter is to update you on the overall status of the Department of Homeland
Security’s (DHS) implementation of GAO’s recommendations and to call your continued
personal attention to areas where open recommendations should be given high priority.
1
In
November 2023, we reported that, on a government-wide basis, 75 percent of our
recommendations made 4 years ago were implemented.
2
DHS’s recommendation
implementation rate was 84 percent. As of June 2024, DHS had 478 open recommendations.
Fully implementing these open recommendations could significantly improve agency
operations.
Since our June 2023 letter, DHS has implemented 16 of our 42 open priority recommendations.
• In 2023, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) implemented procedures to
annually analyze the profit Write Your Own (WYO) insurers earn and the related
compensation received and expenses incurred to sell and service federal flood insurance
policies and adjust and pay claims. Annually analyzing actual WYO expenses,
compensation payments, and resulting profit are now part of FEMA's established business
processes with defined roles for its Federal Insurance and Mitigation Administration staff.
These procedures and the insights gained from analysis of the results each year will help to
inform FEMA as it revises its compensation practices for WYO insurers as required by the
Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012.
3
• FEMA took steps to assess how effectively its disaster workforce was deployed to meet
mission needs in the field. Specifically, FEMA included questions in its 2023 National
Collection Analysis Priorities quarterly survey to collect perspectives on how well deployed
staff met response needs. The agency began collecting data using the survey in January
1
Priority recommendations are those that GAO believes warrant priority attention from heads of key departments or
agencies. They are highlighted because, upon implementation, they may significantly improve government
operations, for example, by realizing large dollar savings; eliminating mismanagement, fraud, and abuse; or making
progress toward addressing a high-risk or duplication issue.
2
GAO, Performance and Accountability Report: Fiscal Year 2023, GAO-24-900483 (Washington, D.C.: Nov. 15, 2023).
3
GAO, Flood Insurance: Opportunities Exist to Improve Oversight of the WYO Program, GAO-09-455 (Washington,
D.C.: August 21, 2009).
