Securing a vision for institute

Tuesday, Oct. 10, 2006 | 7:20 a.m.

Scott Smith acknowledges that he doesn't bring a lot of homeland security experience to UNLV's troubled Institute for Security Studies.

But what the retired Army major general says he does bring to the job as the institute's new executive director are solid administrative skills and an understanding of how to manage university-level research - exactly what is needed to give direction and accountability to the counterterrorism institute.

"I think the people (who) are on board are good people and (are) fully capable of discharging the kinds of things we're supposed to be doing," Smith said in an interview Monday after his first week on the job. "I do sense some shortcomings in simple management."

An internal UNLV audit, prompted by a June story in the Sun on the institute's failings, found shoddy record keeping and an overall lack of oversight at the secretive organization.

It also found that the institute - which had promised to turn UNLV into a leading academic authority on homeland security - lacked focus in fulfilling its central mission.

High on Smith's list of priorities is hiring a financial manager to keep track of the institute's records and a business manager to oversee daily office activities - two positions the institute has never had in its three years of existence.

"Many of the deficiencies that have been pointed out are shortcomings in documentation, procurement activities and reporting," he said. "There is no fraud. There is no abuse. There is no criminality whatsoever. But there is a certain laxity that you find in an organization that is just getting off the ground."

Smith said he also is looking to put together something else the institute has never had - a long-term strategic plan.

"I want to lay out our expectations clearly," he said, adding that he hopes to have the plan written by the end of the year. "We need to have a vision of where we intend to go in the future."

To help him provide that vision, Smith said he intends to create a research advisory group of university academics and community leaders.

At 72, Smith, a civil engineer by trade, has a wealth of Army training to call upon as he attempts to steer the institute back on course.

He spent 32 years in the Army, including a stint as commander of the Army's Europe Engineer Division in Germany. Smith also spent two years in the Reagan administration as a deputy secretary of state, specializing in nuclear safety and security exercises.

After retiring from the Army in 1989, Smith joined the Coors Brewing Co. in Golden, Colo., where he oversaw the company's environmental, health and safety program for the next decade.

He spent the past seven years as chief executive of the Western Research Institute, a private nonprofit organization affiliated with the University of Wyoming in Laramie. The institute, which received Energy Department funding, specialized in energy, environmental and highway construction materials research.

Smith said he already has met with UNLV officials looking to restart an aborted master's program in crisis and emergency management and has told them that he understands the institute will play a secondary role in that task. The plan is for the institute to help UNLV's public administration department bring in experts and recruit students to the program.

Smith said that he also wants to involve students and faculty in the institute's ongoing technical research.

And he hopes the institute will continue to provide training for emergency response professionals and one day commission scholarly white papers on homeland security issues.

All of this, he said, means he will likely have to hire an academic director.

Smith's goal is to have the institute "squared away" by March 31.

"It's my experience in other places that it takes a while to turn a battleship," he said. "I'd like this to be an organization that is an integral part of the UNLV community - an organization that brings scholarly opportunities and business opportunities and research opportunities to all the other elements within UNLV."

For that to happen, he said, morale within the institute will have to be improved.

"You've got to be proud of where you are and what you do," he said. "I want us to be known for that."

Smith sees UNLV, in the shadow of the Las Vegas Strip and the Nevada Test Site, as the "perfect place" to carve out a niche in anti-terrorism.

As for the institute, despite its missteps and broken promises, its future is bright, he insisted.

"It embodies a number of the essential elements of a growing organization that can make a positive and acknowledged contribution to America's homeland security," Smith said.