Security clearance process improving, GAO report says

[unhappycamper]

Security clearance process improving, GAO report says
By Leo Shane III, Stars and Stripes
Pacific edition, Thursday-Friday, December 25-26, 2008

WASHINGTON — Most security clearances for sensitive government work now take less than three months to process, a dramatic improvement but still behind the two-month standard Congress mandated by the end of 2009.

The Office of Personnel Management and the Defense Department processed nearly 450,000 requests for confidential, secret and top-secret clearances in fiscal 2008, and completed nearly 360,000 within 87 days, according to new data from the Government Accountability Office.

Two years ago, the average for most cases was more than 120 days, according to OPM statistics. The GAO praised the agencies for improvements but noted they still need better practices to reach the 60-day goal.

In a letter to the GAO, Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence James Clapper Jr. wrote that the wait time for 80 percent of clearance cases has dropped even further, to about 76 days, as of the end of October.

He added that a joint security team has also recommended improvements to the process — among them stricter regulations on time lines and documentation of cases — and expects to meet the congressional goal.


Rest of article at: http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=59623



uhc comment: I'm sure glad they shortened the time to get a clearance - now can we get on with VA claims?