A bipartisan group of lawmakers wants to expand the ability of an independent agency to investigate government surveillance activities. The Strengthening Privacy, Oversight and Transparency (SPOT) Act would expand the role of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB) — an executive branch watchdog group formed as a result of suggestion from the 9/11 Commission to investigate the privacy implications of counterterrorism policies.

The legislation, spearheaded by Sen. Ron Wyden, (D-Ore.) and Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) and co-sponsored by Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) and Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), would expand PCLOB's oversight to cover all government surveillance activities and strengthen its ability to investigate policies. For instance, the bill would make PCLOB an authorized recipient of whistleblower complaints, including from contractors and detailees, and allow it to issue its own subpoenas.

"The Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board’s mission is fundamental to Americans’ constitutional rights, but it can do even better work if its authorities are expanded and clarified," Wyden said in a press release. "This bill gives the board the teeth it needs to fulfill its mandate of ensuring the government’s efforts to protect citizens at home and abroad also protect Americans’ privacy and civil liberties."

David Medine, chairman of the group, said in an interview with The Washington Post that the board's current counterterrorism mandate keeps it quite busy and it hasn't yet felt limited by the scope of its purview, but expects the group's work to expand in the coming years. Medine was confirmed in May 2013, just a month before revelations about National Security Agency activities from former contractor Edward Snowden greatly increased the visibility of the board.

President Obama waited nearly three years into his presidency to nominate a full slate of members to the board, and while the other four current board members were confirmed in 2012, the board was not authorized to hire staff members without a chairperson. That's another aspect the SPOT Act would change, by allowing for the board to hire staff by majority vote if the chairmanship is vacant.

At the time Medine took over the chairmanship, the agency had just two staff members loaned from other agencies. It almost immediately hired a handful of staffers who helped with the groups' review of programs revealed in the NSA leaks. PCLOB's report on the domestic phone records program decried it as "illegal," although it later largely sanctioned the government's foreign surveillance programs to the disappointment of many members of the privacy advocacy community.

Of the board members, only Medine is full-time -- the other four members are part-time. The SPOT Act would convert all members to full-time positions, but give present members the option to choose to remain part-time until the end of their terms. This, Medine says, would probably be in the long-term interests of fulfilling PCLOB's mission.

"I think there are some benefits to having part-time board members -- they bring different perspectives -- but as the workload increases, I think having full-time board members that can more easily get together to discuss things and perhaps respond more quickly," he said. "I think going forward it would make sense."

PCLOB has about a dozen staff members in addition to the board. But the group is supposed to run as an independent agency, meaning those staff members are supposed to not just assisting with reviews of government surveillance projects, they are also working on office management, responding to FOIA requests, and the other requirements of running a government agency.

One of the biggest challenges to PCLOB is having the funds to carry out its mission, said Medine. The president proposed increasing the agency's annual budget from around $3 million to $8 million for fiscal 2015, he said, but the recent continuing resolution holds them to previous -year funding. "We can manage on that through December," he said, although it may force them to delay hiring or lose the ability to recruit certain prospective staff members, "but after that it would seriously hamper our operations."