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Washington, D.C.—More than 40 federal agencies rely on employees of the Customs Service to ensure compliance with import laws and regulations affecting their missions, a responsibility that underscores the importance of keeping Customs as a separate entity within a Department of Homeland Security, the leader of the union representing Customs employees said today.

In testimony before the Senate Finance Committee, President Colleen M. Kelley of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) said maintaining Customs as a distinct entity within a homeland security agency “would help retain the emphasis on the importance of Customs’ trade-related duties.”

The committee is examining the impact on international trade of the administration’s proposal to create a cabinet-level Department of Homeland Security. NTEU represents some 12,000 Customs employees, whose duties include—in addition to border security—facilitation of some $1.3 trillion worth of trade annually at the nation’s 301 air, land and seaports.

“Trade issues such as textile transshipment enforcement, trade agreement circumvention, and the use of counterfeit visas to enter inadmissible goods would simply fall farther down the priority list” for Customs in a consolidated homeland security agency, the NTEU leader told the committee.

Kelley noted that “the interaction” between Customs’ law enforcement and trade facilitation missions is key to discovering counterfeit goods, and thwarting intellectual property piracy. She added that the expertise of

Customs trade enforcement personnel “assists law enforcement in developing targeting criteria, as well as targeting suspect shipments and starting investigations.”

To separate these two vital functions, she said, “would compromise the current effectiveness of all Customs employees.”

At the same time, President Kelley urged congressional approval of action by the House Government Reform Committee in protecting the collective bargaining rights of employees who would be transferred to the new department. And she called for passage of legislation that would provide law enforcement status, as is provided for other federal law officers, for Customs inspectors and canine enforcement officers.

The NTEU leader encouraged Congress to provide greater resources for Customs, including reauthorization of a critically important user fee scheduled to expire on September 30, 2003. The COBRA fund pays for overtime for Customs inspectors and canine enforcement officers, and funds about 1,100 Customs positions around the country, but the administration’s proposed fiscal year 2003 budget fails to call for its reauthorization.

Kelley called the proposed Customs budget of $3.18 billion for fiscal 2003 “a token increase,” and said “NTEU feels that this budget is simply inadequate to meet the needs of Customs personnel, especially in light of the incidents surrounding September 11.”

In connection with its trade facilitation mission, she noted that Customs generates more revenue for the U.S. Treasury than any agency other than the Internal Revenue Service, pointing out that last year it deposited more than $22.1 billion into Treasury.

The administration’s budget proposal, however, and in particular the president’s stated intention to provide no additional funding nor staffing for homeland security agencies, would put at risk the ability of Customs employees to perform their jobs in the manner in which they are capable, President Kelley said.

The NTEU leader said Customs is in serious need of “adequate and consistent funding” not just for sufficient personnel, but “to purchase, operate and maintain” new technologies that will allow it to perform its multiple and unique missions affecting both border security and trade facilitation.

NTEU is the largest independent federal union, representing some 150,000 employees in 25 agencies and departments.