Latest news with #U.S.HouseCommitteeonOversightandGovernmentReform
Yahoo
12-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Report on false alerts sent during L.A. fires calls for more regulation, scrutiny
After conducting an investigation into Los Angeles County's faulty emergency alerts during the deadly January wildfires, U.S. Congressman Robert Garcia issued a report Monday calling for more federal oversight of the nation's patchwork, privatized emergency alert system. The investigation was launched by Garcia and more than a dozen members of L.A.'s congressional delegation in February after L.A. County sent a series of faulty evacuation alerts on Jan. 9, urging people across a metropolitan region of 10 million to prepare to evacuate. The faulty alerts came two days after intense firestorms erupted in Pacific Palisades and Altadena. The alerts, which were intended for a small group of residents near Calabasas, stoked panic and confusion as they were blasted out repeatedly to communities as far as 40 miles away from the evacuation area. Read more: Investigation launched into L.A. County's faulty emergency alert system The new report, 'Sounding the Alarm: Lessons From the Kenneth Fire False Alerts,' alleged that a technical flaw by Genasys, the software company contracted with the county to issue wireless emergency alerts, caused the faulty alert to ping across the sprawling metro region. It also found that, contrary to accounts of L.A. County officials at the time, multiple echo alerts then went out as cellphone providers experienced overload due to the high volume and long duration of the alerts. Confusion was compounded, the report said, by L.A. County's vague wording of the original alert. 'It's clear that there's still so much reform needed, so that we have operating systems that people can rely on and trust in the future,' Garcia told The Times. The Times was reaching out to Genasys and county officials for response to the report. A Long Beach Democrat who sits on the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Garcia said the stakes were incredibly high. 'We're talking about loss of life and property, and people's confidence in our emergency notification systems," he said. "People need to be able to trust that if there's a natural disaster, that they're going to get an alert and it's going to have correct information, and we have to provide that level of security and comfort across the country.' To improve emergency warning alert systems, the report urges Congress and the federal government to "act now to close gaps in alerting system performance, certification, and public communication." 'The lessons from the Kenneth Fire should not only inform reforms," the report states, "but serve as a catalyst to modernize the nation's alerting infrastructure before the next disaster strikes." The report makes several recommendations. It calls for more federal funding for planning, equipment, training and system maintenance on the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Integrated Public Alert & Warning System, the national system that provides emergency public alerts through mobile phones using Wireless Emergency Alerts and to radio and television via the Emergency Alert System. It also urges FEMA to fully complete minimum requirements and improve training to IPAWS that Congress mandated in 2019 after the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency sent out a false warning of an incoming missile attack to millions of residents and vacationers. Five years after Congress required 'the standardization, functionality, and interoperability of incident management and warning tools," the report said, FEMA has yet to finish implementing certification programs for users and third-party software providers. The agency plans to pilot a third-party technology certification program this year. Read more: Western Altadena got evacuation order many hours after Eaton fire exploded. 17 people died there The report also presses the Federal Communications Commission to establish performance standards and develop measurable goals and monitoring for WEA performance, and ensure mobile providers include location-aware maps by the December 2026 deadline. But the push for greater oversight is certain to be a challenge at a time when President Trump and U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem are pushing for FEMA to be dismantled. In the last few days, the Trump administration fired FEMA's acting head, Cameron Hamilton, after he told U.S. lawmakers he does not support eliminating the agency. Noem told U.S. Congress members at a hearing last week that Trump believes the agency has "failed the American people, and that FEMA, as it exists today, should be eliminated in empowering states to respond to disasters with federal government support.' Garcia described the Trump administration's dismantling of FEMA as 'very concerning.' 'We need to have stable FEMA leadership,' Garcia told The Times. 'The recent reshuffling and changes that are happening, I hope, do not get in the way of actually making these systems stronger. We need stability at FEMA. We need FEMA to continue to exist. … The sooner that we get the investments in, the sooner that we complete these studies, I think the more safe people are going to feel.' Garcia said his office was working on drafting legislation that could address some of these issues. 'We really need to push FEMA and we need to push the administration — and Congress absolutely has a role in making sure these systems are stronger,' Garcia said. 'Ensuring that we fully fund these systems is critical. ... There's dozens of these systems, and yet there's no real kind of centralized rules that are modern.' According to FEMA, more than 40 different commercial providers work in the emergency alert market. But further steps need to be taken, an agency official said, to train local emergency managers and regulate the private software companies and wireless providers that play a pivotal role in safeguarding millions of Americans during severe wildfires, hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and active shooter incidents. "Ongoing efforts are needed to increase training with alerting authorities, enhance standardization with service providers, and further collaboration with wireless providers to improve the delivery of Wireless Emergency Alerts to the public," Thomas Breslin, acting associate administrator of FEMA's Office of National Continuity Programs, said in a letter to Garcia. Genasys, a San Diego-based company, said in a recent SEC filing that its "ALERT coverage has expanded into cities and counties in 39 states." 'The vast majority of California" is covered by its EVAC system, it said, which continues 'to grow into the eastern United States, with covered areas expanding into Texas, South Carolina, and Tennessee.' Read more: After AI bar exam fiasco, State Bar of California faces deeper financial crisis Genasys also noted that its ALERT system is an 'interactive, cloud-based" software service, raising the possibility of communication disruption. 'The information technology systems we and our vendors use are vulnerable to outages, breakdowns or other damage or interruption from service interruptions, system malfunction, natural disasters, terrorism, war, and telecommunication and electrical failures,' it said in its SEC filing. As part of its investigation into how evacuation warnings were accidentally sent to nearly 10 million L.A. County residents during the L.A. fires, Garcia received responses from Genasys, L.A. County, FEMA and the FCC. The report said a L.A. County emergency management worker saved an alert correctly with a narrowly defined polygon in the area near the Kenneth fire. But the software did not upload the correct evacuation area polygon to IPAWS, possibly due to a network disruption, the report said. The Genasys system also did not warn the L.A. County emergency management staffer that drafted the alert a targeted polygon was missing in the IPAWS channel before it sent the message, the report found. Genasys has since added safeguards to its software, but the report noted that Genasys did not provide details about the incident. . It suggested the independent after-action review into the Eaton and Palisades fire response "further investigate Genasys' claims of what caused the error, and how a network disruption would have occurred or could have blocked the proper upload of a polygon into the IPAWS distribution channel.' The report commended L.A. County for responding quickly in canceling the alert within 2 minutes and 47 seconds and issuing a corrected message about 20 minutes later, stating the alert was sent 'in ERROR.' But it also criticized the county's wording of the original alert as vague. Some confusion could have been avoided, it said, if the emergency management staffer who wrote the alert had described the area with more geographic specificity and included timestamps. The report also found that a series of false echo alerts that went out over the next few days were not caused by cellphone towers coming back online after being knocked down because of the fires, as L.A. County emergency management officials reported. Instead, they were caused by cellphone networks' technical issues. One cellphone company attributed the duplicate alerts to a result of 'overload, due to high volume and long duration of alerts sent during fires.' While the report said the company installed a temporary patch and was developing a permanent repair, it is unclear if other networks have enabled safeguards to make sure they do not face similar problems. The report did not delve into the critical delays in electronic emergency alerts sent to areas of Altadena. When flames erupted from Eaton Canyon on Jan. 7, neighborhoods on the east side of Altadena got evacuation orders at 7:26 p.m., but residents to the west did not receive orders until 3:25 a.m. — hours after fires began to destroy their neighborhoods. Seventeen of the 18 people confirmed dead in the Eaton fire were on the west side. Garcia told The Times that the problems in Altadena appeared to be due to human error, rather than technical errors with emergency alert software. Garcia said he and other L.A. Congress members were anxious to read the McChrystal Group's after-action review of the response to the Eaton and Palisades fires. Local, state and federal officials all shared some blame for the problems with alerts in the L.A. fire, Garcia said. Going forward, Congress should press the federal government, he said, to develop a reliable regulatory system for alerts. 'When you have so many operators and you don't have these IPAWS requirements in place, that is concerning," Garcia said. "We should have a standard that's federal, that's clear.' Garcia told The Times that emergency alerts were not just a Southern California issue. "These systems are used around the country,' he said. 'This can impact any community, and so it's in everyone's best interests to move forward and to work with FEMA, to work with the FCC, to make sure that we make these adjustments and changes. I think it's very critical." Times staff writer Paige St. John contributed to this report. Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Los Angeles Times
12-05-2025
- Politics
- Los Angeles Times
Report on false alerts sent during L.A. fires calls for more regulation, scrutiny
After conducting an investigation into Los Angeles County's faulty emergency alerts during the deadly January wildfires, U.S. Congressman Robert Garcia issued a report Monday calling for more federal oversight of the nation's patchwork, privatized emergency alert system. The investigation was launched by Garcia and more than a dozen members of L.A.'s congressional delegation in February after L.A. County sent a series of faulty evacuation alerts on Jan. 9, urging people across a metropolitan region of 10 million to prepare to evacuate. The faulty alerts came two days after intense firestorms erupted in Pacific Palisades and Altadena. The alerts, which were intended for a small group of residents near Calabasas, stoked panic and confusion as they were blasted out repeatedly to communities as far as 40 miles away from the evacuation area. The new report, 'Sounding the Alarm: Lessons From the Kenneth Fire False Alerts,' alleged that a technical flaw by Genasys, the software company contracted with the county to issue wireless emergency alerts, caused the faulty alert to ping across the sprawling metro region. It also found that, contrary to accounts of L.A. County officials at the time, multiple echo alerts then went out as cellphone providers experienced overload due to the high volume and long duration of the alerts. Confusion was compounded, the report said, by L.A. County's vague wording of the original alert. 'It's clear that there's still so much reform needed, so that we have operating systems that people can rely on and trust in the future,' Garcia told The Times. The Times was reaching out to Genasys and county officials for response to the report. A Long Beach Democrat who sits on the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Garcia said the stakes were incredibly high. 'We're talking about loss of life and property, and people's confidence in our emergency notification systems,' he said. 'People need to be able to trust that if there's a natural disaster, that they're going to get an alert and it's going to have correct information, and we have to provide that level of security and comfort across the country.' To improve emergency warning alert systems, the report urges Congress and the federal government to 'act now to close gaps in alerting system performance, certification, and public communication.' 'The lessons from the Kenneth Fire should not only inform reforms,' the report states, 'but serve as a catalyst to modernize the nation's alerting infrastructure before the next disaster strikes.' The report makes several recommendations. It calls for more federal funding for planning, equipment, training and system maintenance on the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Integrated Public Alert & Warning System, the national system that provides emergency public alerts through mobile phones using Wireless Emergency Alerts and to radio and television via the Emergency Alert System. It also urges FEMA to fully complete minimum requirements and improve training to IPAWS that Congress mandated in 2019 after the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency sent out a false warning of an incoming missile attack to millions of residents and vacationers. Five years after Congress required 'the standardization, functionality, and interoperability of incident management and warning tools,' the report said, FEMA has yet to finish implementing certification programs for users and third-party software providers. The agency plans to pilot a third-party technology certification program this year. The report also presses the Federal Communications Commission to establish performance standards and develop measurable goals and monitoring for WEA performance, and ensure mobile providers include location-aware maps by the December 2026 deadline. But the push for greater oversight is certain to be a challenge at a time when President Trump and U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem are pushing for FEMA to be dismantled. In the last few days, the Trump administration fired FEMA's acting head, Cameron Hamilton, after he told U.S. lawmakers he does not support eliminating the agency. Noem told U.S. Congress members at a hearing last week that Trump believes the agency has 'failed the American people, and that FEMA, as it exists today, should be eliminated in empowering states to respond to disasters with federal government support.' Garcia described the Trump administration's dismantling of FEMA as 'very concerning.' 'We need to have stable FEMA leadership,' Garcia told The Times. 'The recent reshuffling and changes that are happening, I hope, do not get in the way of actually making these systems stronger. We need stability at FEMA. We need FEMA to continue to exist. … The sooner that we get the investments in, the sooner that we complete these studies, I think the more safe people are going to feel.' Garcia said his office was working on drafting legislation that could address some of these issues. 'We really need to push FEMA and we need to push the administration — and Congress absolutely has a role in making sure these systems are stronger,' Garcia said. 'Ensuring that we fully fund these systems is critical. ... There's dozens of these systems, and yet there's no real kind of centralized rules that are modern.' According to FEMA, more than 40 different commercial providers work in the emergency alert market. But further steps need to be taken, an agency official said, to train local emergency managers and regulate the private software companies and wireless providers that play a pivotal role in safeguarding millions of Americans during severe wildfires, hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and active shooter incidents. 'Ongoing efforts are needed to increase training with alerting authorities, enhance standardization with service providers, and further collaboration with wireless providers to improve the delivery of Wireless Emergency Alerts to the public,' Thomas Breslin, acting associate administrator of FEMA's Office of National Continuity Programs, said in a letter to Garcia. Genasys, a San Diego-based company, said in a recent SEC filing that its 'ALERT coverage has expanded into cities and counties in 39 states.' 'The vast majority of California' is covered by its EVAC system, it said, which continues 'to grow into the eastern United States, with covered areas expanding into Texas, South Carolina, and Tennessee.' Genasys also noted that its ALERT system is an 'interactive, cloud-based' software service, raising the possibility of communication disruption. 'The information technology systems we and our vendors use are vulnerable to outages, breakdowns or other damage or interruption from service interruptions, system malfunction, natural disasters, terrorism, war, and telecommunication and electrical failures,' it said in its SEC filing. As part of its investigation into how evacuation warnings were accidentally sent to nearly 10 million L.A. County residents during the L.A. fires, Garcia received responses from Genasys, L.A. County, FEMA and the FCC. The report said a L.A. County emergency management worker saved an alert correctly with a narrowly defined polygon in the area near the Kenneth fire. But the software did not upload the correct evacuation area polygon to IPAWS, possibly due to a network disruption, the report said. The Genasys system also did not warn the L.A. County emergency management staffer that drafted the alert a targeted polygon was missing in the IPAWS channel before it sent the message, the report found. Genasys has since added safeguards to its software, but the report noted that Genasys did not provide details about the incident. . It suggested the independent after-action review into the Eaton and Palisades fire response 'further investigate Genasys' claims of what caused the error, and how a network disruption would have occurred or could have blocked the proper upload of a polygon into the IPAWS distribution channel.' The report commended L.A. County for responding quickly in canceling the alert within 2 minutes and 47 seconds and issuing a corrected message about 20 minutes later, stating the alert was sent 'in ERROR.' But it also criticized the county's wording of the original alert as vague. Some confusion could have been avoided, it said, if the emergency management staffer who wrote the alert had described the area with more geographic specificity and included timestamps. The report also found that a series of false echo alerts that went out over the next few days were not caused by cellphone towers coming back online after being knocked down because of the fires, as L.A. County emergency management officials reported. Instead, they were caused by cellphone networks' technical issues. One cellphone company attributed the duplicate alerts to a result of 'overload, due to high volume and long duration of alerts sent during fires.' While the report said the company installed a temporary patch and was developing a permanent repair, it is unclear if other networks have enabled safeguards to make sure they do not face similar problems. The report did not delve into the critical delays in electronic emergency alerts sent to areas of Altadena. When flames erupted from Eaton Canyon on Jan. 7, neighborhoods on the east side of Altadena got evacuation orders at 7:26 p.m., but residents to the west did not receive orders until 3:25 a.m. — hours after fires began to destroy their neighborhoods. Seventeen of the 18 people confirmed dead in the Eaton fire were on the west side. Garcia told The Times that the problems in Altadena appeared to be due to human error, rather than technical errors with emergency alert software. Garcia said he and other L.A. Congress members were anxious to read the McChrystal Group's after-action review of the response to the Eaton and Palisades fires. Local, state and federal officials all shared some blame for the problems with alerts in the L.A. fire, Garcia said. Going forward, Congress should press the federal government, he said, to develop a reliable regulatory system for alerts. 'When you have so many operators and you don't have these IPAWS requirements in place, that is concerning,' Garcia said. 'We should have a standard that's federal, that's clear.' Garcia told The Times that emergency alerts were not just a Southern California issue. 'These systems are used around the country,' he said. 'This can impact any community, and so it's in everyone's best interests to move forward and to work with FEMA, to work with the FCC, to make sure that we make these adjustments and changes. I think it's very critical.' Times staff writer Paige St. John contributed to this report.
Yahoo
10-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Trump threatens to withhold federal funding from sanctuary cities
CHICAGO (WGN) — President Donald Trump on Thursday morning said his administration is 'working on papers' to withhold federal funding from cities and states with policies that limit local law enforcement from cooperating with federal authorities on immigration matters. 'No more Sanctuary Cities! They protect the Criminals, not the Victims. They are disgracing our Country, and are being mocked all over the World,' Trump wrote on his social media platform. 'Working on papers to withhold all Federal Funding for any City or State that allows these Death Traps to exist!!!' Mayor Brandon Johnson acknowledged in January the receipt of a letter from Washington, D.C., that states, in summary, that Chicago and other cities like it — notably Denver, New York and Boston, all of which hold sanctuary city status like Chicago — are being investigated by the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. He testified before a Congressional panel last month. Chicago's policy that prevents city officials (including police officers) from cooperating with federal immigration authorities has been in place, in some form, for 40 years. Chicago's history as a sanctuary city spans 40 years, 7 presidents and 5 mayors In 2017, Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner signed a bill which barred police from arresting anyone solely due to their immigration status. Gov. JB Pritzker signed further legislation in 2021 with additional protections. 'The bipartisan Illinois TRUST Act, signed into law by a Republican governor, has always been compliant with federal law and still is today,' Pritzker said in February. 'Illinois will defend our laws that prioritize police resources for fighting crime while enabling state law enforcement to assist with arresting violent criminals.' The Department of Justice claims Illinois' TRUST Act and Chicago's Welcoming City Ordinance are invalid due to the Supremacy is a developing story and will be updated. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
CBS News
07-03-2025
- Politics
- CBS News
Small Business Administration closing Denver office over immigration policies
The U.S. Small Business Administration announced Thursday it will be leaving Denver and relocating. The administration said it will move its regional offices out of what they call "sanctuary cities." A new location has not been announced, but they said the offices will be "more accessible locations that better serve the small business community." This announcement came one day after Denver Mayor Mike Johnston testified on Capitol Hill on the city's immigration policies. Johnston was one of four mayors of so-called "sanctuary cities" to testify in front of the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. The term "sanctuary city" refers to a wide range of policies that limit cooperation with federal immigration agents. While the Democratic mayors argued their policies are necessary to ensure undocumented immigrants report crimes and access city services, Republican representatives said the mayors are defying President Trump and releasing criminals. Johnston said Denver's policies don't shield immigrants from law enforcement, stating instead the city "provides services" to immigrants. He said that Denver was the victim of a situation the city didn't create, and he has an obligation to protect the health and safety of everyone in the city. "All told, 42,000 people arrived in Denver over 18 months, the largest per capita influx of any city in America," said Johnston. "The question Denver faced was what will you do with a mom and two kids dropped on the streets of our city with no warm clothes, no food and no place to stay?"
Yahoo
06-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Boebert claims Johnston proved Denver is a ‘sanctuary' city; advocates voice support of such policies
DENVER (KDVR) — Denver Mayor Mike Johnston was one of four city leaders from what Congressional Republicans called 'sanctuary cities' grilled in front of the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform on Wednesday. Johnston was questioned alongside the mayors of Boston, Chicago and New York City, all of which have been dubbed 'sanctuary cities.' Denver mayor questioned on release protocols with ICE after alleged assault Sanctuary cities are jurisdictions that have announced limits on how much they will cooperate with federal agencies' efforts to deport undocumented immigrants. Some cities take it one step further and solidify the designation through an ordinance, but Denver has not. Rep. Lauren Boebert, a member of the oversight committee, spoke with Nexstar on Wednesday after Johnston took the stand. 'Well, I think Mayor Mike Johnston really proved that Denver is a sanctuary city. My main goal and objective was proving that we have sanctuary policies both at a state level, and then even Denver, city ordinances, that do make it impossible for ICE agents to coordinate with local law enforcement agents,' Boebert said. Nayda Benitez, of the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition, told FOX31's Kasia Kerridge they are frustrated by the need for the four mayors to testify at all. 'To us, this is, you know, just the latest attack against places, communities, cities across the U.S. that have been champions for immigrant rights. It seems to us that it was really just political theater,' Benitez said. Boebert seemed skeptical that Johnston supports coordination and communication between city employees and federal agents when an immigration detainer or warrant has been issued. Denver Mayor Mike Johnston takes the stand in DC on 'sanctuary policies' 'We have seen case after case in Colorado where a migrant was detained and then released because there was not a federal warrant and even knowing that these individuals were in the country illegally, they were unable to coordinate with ICE to actually get their removal from our country and unfortunately they went on to commit even worse crimes in our state,' Boebert said. Undocumented or improper entry into the U.S. is a civil infraction and does not carry a criminal penalty. Benitez mostly applauded Johnston for his testimony, but worried about some of the nuance in his statements. 'We do appreciate the mayor trying to hold the line and stand in support of immigrant communities,' Benitez said. 'We do wonder and question what he meant by implying that he would support federal agents when it came to immigrants that are criminals. What does that mean exactly?' Boebert also noted that Johnston isn't 'exactly wrong in saying that crime is down in Denver.' She said he didn't provide enough context for the situation, saying the 42,000 immigrants who came or were bused to Denver were then instructed on 'how to get out and even give them the same day shipping and move them to places like Utah or Aurora or even New York.' She said that Mayor Eric Adams, of NYC, confirmed there was coordination between Colorado and New York to move immigrants eastward. 'And then we have the governor of Utah who is on the record saying that Mayor Mike Johnston was busing illegals in to Utah and of course, we have seen them being shipped into cities like Aurora as well and you even have the mayor of Aurora on record and councilwoman Danielle Jurinsky saying that this is absolutely happening,' Boebert said. In October, the Aurora City Council voted to investigate whether Denver, the state of Colorado and nonprofits had moved immigrants into Aurora. She said that lower crime in Denver comes at the cost of increasing crime 'in other places,' and said he's moving immigrations from his city at the taxpayers' expense. Denver marks 2 years since migrant crisis began as activists see work left to be done 'I'm sure anyone who is here in the country illegally is afraid to coordinating, cooperate with law enforcement because they are already breaking the law,' the representative asserted. 'They are here illegally and that does not prevent, however, law enforcement from coordinating with federal ICE agents, Denver's ordinance does. Colorado state law absolutely prevents that coordination from taking place.' Benitez said fear is prevalent among Colorado's immigrant population. 'There is a lot of fear, a lot of terror, that uncertainty is palpable among the immigrant community right now,' Benitez said. 'Yesterday, our coalition and some of our members, we hand-delivered a community petition to the Denver Mayor's office yesterday afternoon ahead of the hearing today calling essentially on him to stand by Denver's welcoming city policies and to enforce them, or help those policies remain in place.' Boebert said that Johnston could have joined her Wednesday 'in demanding that Colorado's state laws that he blames for having illegal aliens in such mass numbers in Denver, and using so many tax dollars … He could have joined me in saying, 'get rid of this,' and he refused to.' 'He's had 600 days to repeal or have the city council vote to repeal the ordinance that says city employees of Denver will be fired if they communicate with federal law enforcement officers,' Boebert asserted. 'He's done neither.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
