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At this point, a NIMA Director-Designate was appointed to lead an Implementation
Team drawn from the intelligence and mapping communities. On 28 November 1995,
RADM Joseph (“Jack’’) Dantone, Jr., USN, was announced as the Director-Designate.
His three deputies were Dr. Annette Krygiel from CIO, Leo Hazlewood from CIA and W.
Douglas Smith from DMA. Sharon Basso moved over from CIO to take charge of Communications
and Congressional Liaison and was responsible for developing a “legislative
strategy’’ to push NIMA through Congress quickly. The team had a package ready for
Congress by 15 April 1996. 437 Leo Hazlewood was told by staffers on the Intelligence
Committees, “If it ain’t here by 15 April, it ain’t.’’ 438
THE LEGISLATIVE STRATEGY
Thus, by the time the Implementation Team was assembled, it had about four months
to craft a package acceptable to both the executive branch and Congress. The pressure
from Deutch was constant. He ordered them to be on the Hill in December to determine
the interests and concerns of relevant committees, members and staffers. Sharon Basso
was the team’s “eyes and ears’’ on the Hill. She remembers the extraordinary support the
team received from CIA’s Congressional Affairs Office. 439 Team members arranged meetings
with anyone who would agree to hear them out. According to Hazlewood, members
rarely had the time and most considered it “a staffer issue.’’ He found House Republican
Members the hardest group to schedule time with and remembers rescheduling an
appointment four times with one Congressman before finally giving up. 440 It was an election
year, and setting up a new agency was not high on their list of priorities. 441
Leo Hazlewood remembers that the team had to worry about thirteen different committees
— Intelligence, Armed Services, Appropriations, Foreign Relations, Judiciary
(on Freedom of Information matters), Government Operations (on personnel authorities)
(six each in the House and Senate) — plus the Joint Committee on Printing (for a
GPO exemption, since in-house capability was needed for printing classified information).
Most of its time, however, was spent with the Intelligence Committee staffers.
Questions usually focused on committee jurisdictional concerns (protecting DCI or
Secretary of Defense interests), how to balance national and combat commander support,
the nature of NIMA’s leadership structure, cost and programmatics (NFIP or
JMIP), personnel concerns such as the DMA union membership issue, and constituent
interests. He recalled being asked, “Are you going to take jobs out of my district?’’ This
became a big concern of Minority Leader Dick Gephardt (DMA in St Louis, MO) and
Senator Arlen Specter (DMA in Philadelphia, PA). 442
437 “Creation of NIMA,” 45. See Appendix G for a copy of a briefing summarizing NIMA’s purpose, Implementation
Team members, and team schedule, working groups, and other background material. See Appendix H
for a diagram of the NIMA decision process. See Appendices J and K for what agencies or programs were
included in or excluded from the NIMA concept.
438 SASC Professional Staffer interview. See Appendix F for a copy of the MOA.
439 Hazlewood interview.
440 Basso interview.
441 Hazlewood interview.
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