Plan to Reorganize INS Won’t Work, Review Concludes

The Immigration and Naturalization Service’s reorganization plan will not work and may even exacerbate problems because it transfers too much authority away from regional offices, a Justice Department advisory panel says in a report to be released today.

The INS is “simply too large, too complex and too geographically dispersed to be effectively managed from Washington,” says the report, the latest in a series of critical reviews of the troubled agency.

The panel recommends maintaining much of the existing autonomy of the agency’s four regional offices, while introducing policy changes giving Washington somewhat greater authority over their operations.

This idea is directly contrary to the INS’ reorganization plan, which calls for downgrading the regional offices’ responsibilities to make them supportive outposts administratively and logistically of a strengthened commissioner’s office. Parts of the INS plan have been implemented by the agency’s senior officials.

The advisory panel report and the agency’s plan are to be unveiled today at a hearing of the immigration, refugees and internal law subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee.

INS officials declined to comment Tuesday on the report. Verne Jervis, an INS spokesman, declined to provide details on the INS reorganization plan. He said that Commissioner Gene McNary would discuss it at the hearing. He said that the agency’s plan has been cleared by officials at the Justice Department and the White House Office of Management and Budget, and is being sent to Capitol Hill.

In the 18 months that McNary has headed the INS, an agency charged with protecting U.S. borders and administering national immigration policies, McNary has battled with the regional commissioners. In recent months, McNary has taken away their authority to interpret regulations, establish budgets and deploy personnel.

Atty. Gen. Dick Thornburgh, who supervises INS operations, instructed Norman A. Carlson, a former director of the federal Bureau of Prisons, to review INS operations and management after a GAO report found widespread mismanagement throughout the agency. Other reports, including an internal Justice Department audit in 1988, also have criticized INS operations.

Findings of the Carlson report were delivered to Thornburgh’s office in February.

According to a copy of the report, prepared by a three-man team from the National Academy of Public Administration, McNary’s moves to centralize all regional operations in Washington is “flawed because it will not provide adequate direction to or coordination of activities in the field.”

The report notes that although INS’ senior management has begun implementing the reorganization changes, such actions are “causing confusion throughout the agency because of the uncertainty of the chain of command.”

McNary’s approach is unlikely to “yield significant improvement,” the report says. “In fact, it is quite possible that the changes recommended by INS senior management will be detrimental to the service.”

The report acknowledged that the regions tend to operate in an autonomous fashion, but said that problem could be fixed without stripping them of important duties. It recommended changing the titles of the top officials from regional commissioner to regional director “to more clearly describe the role and responsibilities of the office.” That would reflect the fact that the regional heads are subordinate to Washington.

Other suggestions in the report include:

* Revamping the INS management training program to develop a career track for civil service managers so they will be able to gain experience throughout the varied departments within the agency.

Calling the current training programs “inadequate for critical mid-level and top-level career management positions,” the report says that the most senior INS executives should have experience at the district, regional and headquarters levels.

* Replacing the INS accounting system, along with revising the agency’s entire financial management operations. Repeating the findings of last year’s General Accounting Office study, the report says that the INS “does not have financial accountability over its resources.” It suggests making top INS officials legally responsible for fund management.

* Improving poor intra-agency communications, which in some cases results in the “development of redundant systems in the regions, sometimes in contravention of agency policy and in disregard of specific central office direction.” The failure to do so has led to the inability of “regional management to recognize the overall authority and need of the service,” the report states.

In addition to Carlson, other members of the panel are William D. Van Stavoren, a private consultant and former deputy associate attorney general, and Don I. Wortman, a National Academy of Public Administration fellow and retired career executive who has served in various federal agencies.