All right , thanks , megan . So we'll get right to it . Herb , I'll start with you . Can you share a little bit about the Office of Health Security ? You know where it came from , where it is today and where you'd like to see it go . Health security you know where it came from , where it is today and where you'd like to see it go .
Yep , sure , good afternoon . Thanks for having me here . So we created OHS in July of 2022 . We're about two and a half years old Listen for folks that are in here from CBP and others . We're a very small office 109 people total and a budget roughly around $80 million , so relatively agile and nimble Few priorities for the office .
One is to not be another layer , but to actually be an operational sort of what I would call from the DOD , a combat support agency or what we call a mission support agency . For the rest of the components , that entails several things . One is we are hiring people who are smart because they've got advanced medical degrees , veterinary degrees , social science degrees .
I mean we hire them to be the best and brightest to either take care of the workforce , take care of migrants , develop an electronic health record or keep the country safe . So that's the first thing we do . Two is we've hired a lot of technology folks to figure out how we can do an electronic health record .
That doesn't go the way of the early steps of Coast Guard , which they struggled , which doesn't go the way of the Department of Veterans Affairs , who struggled . For some of our industry colleagues , those struggles often mean additional money .
The challenge is money is not easy to come by and so we're trying to find a way to do it with the best of breed , the best of show for electronic health records , but not also try to bankrupt the department .
When I tell you we're 80 million a year you look at every other department or agency they spend potentially all their money is on electronic health record I probably cry at every senior leadership . That can be bad . It is really good when you want people to come along with you .
It's really bad when everybody's a green suitor and they've got a gun and they're like who's this guy we hired in the department . That's crying at every . But I will tell you folks being able to be out and around our team and the great people that we have .
It is hard not to be emotional when you hear their personal stories , not just from the work they're doing for us , but their time as a veteran , but you , but their time as a veteran . But you also can hear their stories about family , their spouses , and so I tell people .
Sometimes people do talk to the health folks in a more confident setting , in a more confident manner and also in a confidential manner , and it's great for me to hear these stories from our employees , and so the impetus behind it , chip , was everybody's doing great work , but how can we coalesce this ?
And the last thing , the important thing was who's going to be talking to the secretary every day about keeping this a priority ? You'll hear me mention in a minute this . Last year was the first time that law enforcement was on a secretary's priority budget issue team and I'm going to talk to you when the question comes up what did that mean for the department ?
And I think when I give you some positions , some numbers , you'll totally sort of agree that that is part of it . Last reason for the office was sometimes you're chief medical officer and it's one person . The goal here was not to have one person . I will say a few things about the department that I'm passionate about .
One is I think we're the only CMO left where you have to be a physician . That's sort of a bygone era . You can be a Navy SG , an Army SG , you can be an Air Force Surgeon General . You can be a nurse , you can be a pharmacist , you can be a PA , you can be a nurse practitioner .
Our goal here is also to modernize the department and bring us along to where everybody's at , and if that means at some point in time I do myself out of a job , that's okay by me . But the goal here is to modernize my view on the world is medical probably shouldn't be buried in a custody contract .
We probably need to have a health services contract that everybody clearly knows the impetus is health care , it's mental health , it's physical health .
And then we need to talk about the other data points that are harder to come by , which is not just health data Use of annual leave , use of sick leave , requests for reasonable accommodations , those statistics when they change when a new leader arrives .
We all love Pete , but what if Pete leaves and Herb comes and Herb's not the great guy that Pete was , and all of a sudden everybody at the sector is taking leave . They're asking for reasonable accommodation . Could be Herb has a leadership problem . Somebody needs to gather that data . We have it , but we need to look at it probably more in a macro sense .
We don't want to narrow it down to like you know , you are putting in leave and you and Herb don't get along , but the answer is you and your colleagues have changed your view of work and you've either asked for reasonable accommodation , you've asked for a reassignment . You've , and we need to figure out how we can gather data .
So it's not just help data , it's the whole spectrum of data . Every one of them , when you get to meet them one-on-one , embraces me and the team . What we've got to do is do that in a venue that isn't just the one-on-one , where they're not comfortable talking to Herb and my team in a small room . I will tell you change is coming .
When I go through an airport now , tsa folks know when I'm coming and they find me and they'll say things like my floor mat is wore down , my microwave doesn't work , poor . Dave Pekoski is like Herb stop traveling through airports .
But the goal here is they may seem little to each one of you , but if you're working eight-hour shift checking IDs , the fact that your mat hasn't been replaced is the number one thing on your mind , because when you get home , you're not engaging your kids because you're working with back pain for two or three hours . And so I think it's the message .
It's us working together as a unified team . It's you all being a partner with us and telling us what you've done for other people so we don't need to reinvent the wheel . And then it's also leveraging industry . But also we've got to meet our employees where they're at .
We've got the southern border down , we've got a northern border , we've got interior communities , we've got airports that are nowhere near a border and we got a lot of employees . We got Malibu . Right now We've got FEMA folks that are preparing to go to another disaster . The resources for them have to go with them . They can't go to El Paso or San Antonio .
They got to have them with them .
So I'll just close by saying you know I spent seven years in the department and you know where it was then . By the way , did you notice Herb mentioned , rattled off , several things that I was responsible for ? That didn't go well . But that's neither here nor there , Herb .
But what I'll tell you is from my view you know , way out in Texas now , looking in the department has come miles in terms of what it does for its workforce and how it cares deeply for its workforce . And that doesn't happen by accident .
It requires hard work and leadership , and the leadership of CBP , the leadership of Herb and the department is evidenced and I think the workforce sees that . So , on behalf of the nation that's out there , we owe you a debt of thanks for what you're doing every day and your focus on the care of those who are protecting us .
So , on behalf of all of them , thank you for what you're doing and thank you guys for being here . Thank you .