Case Study: Program & Project Support

R&D Program in the Department of Homeland Security

In late 2001, Lewis-Burke worked with the Senate Committee on Governmental Affair and the House Science Committee on a research and development component to legislation to establish the Department of Homeland Security.  Lewis-Burke proposed the establishment of a Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)-like research agency within the new Department – a proposal incorporated into the legislation introduced by Senator Joseph Lieberman (D-CT). In 2002, when President Bush proposed his own legislation to create a new Department of Homeland Security, no comparable proposal was included.

Working in a bipartisan fashion and joined by the higher education and research communities, Lewis-Burke was instrumental in ensuring that the new agency, now called the Homeland Security Advanced Research Projects Agency or HSARPA, was included in the final legislation creating the new Department of Homeland Security. Today funding for the research activities of HSARPA exceeds $300 million a year.