WASHINGTON – The U.S. Homeland Security Department is developing a new plan for screening people with access to high-risk chemical plants for possible terrorist ties that will allow industry to make use of credentialing programs in which they already participate, DHS officials said on Tuesday.

The new plan will allow chemical companies to use the existing Transportation Worker Identification Credential program to satisfy a DHS requirement that those with access to select facilities are screened for links to terrorist groups, the officials said. The Transportation Security Administration and the U.S. Coast Guard currently use the program to screen workers at port facilities and other sensitive areas.

The department pulled its previous screening proposal in July. That plan, under which chemical companies would have been required to submit information about people authorized to enter select facilities that contain toxic chemicals, had been languishing at the White House Management and Budget Office since June 2011.

The scrapped plan had faced strong opposition from powerful industry groups, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the American Chemistry Council and the American Petroleum Institute, which argued it would have duplicated existing security screening programs.

In order to avoid such duplication, the department should allow chemical companies to use the TWIC program or other existing initiatives, the industry groups argued. Many of their employees have already been credentialed through such efforts, according to the organizations.

Obtaining a TWIC credential requires people to "provide biographic and biometric information such as fingerprints, sit for a digital photograph and successfully pass a security threat assessment conducted by" the Transportation Security Administration, according to the agency website.

The new plan will be submitted for White House approval and public comment by October, Homeland Security Undersecretary Rand Beers told the House Energy and Commerce environment and economy subcommittee on Tuesday.

The screening requirement is a component of the DHS Chemical Facility Antiterrorism Standards initiative, which aims to prevent the intentional release of industrial chemicals into the environment. The effort has been under fire from House Republicans since late last year when a leaked DHS memo detailed a host of problems with implementation including that the department had failed to complete site inspections and approve facility security plans.

In testimony to the committee, Beers said the department as of this month has completed 59 of the 95 action items it had identified as necessary to address the problems detailed in the memo. Republican panel members, though, continued to hammer Beers and his colleagues for what they said was inadequate progress.

Representative Bill Cassidy (R-La.) grilled Beers and David Wulf, deputy director of the DHS Infrastructure Security Compliance Division, over whether they had fired any program personnel since the internal memo was publicized. Cassidy said the memo had suggested that some people had been hired to fill positions for which they were not well suited.

Beers and Wulf indicated that while they had not fired anyone, the department had retrained employees in cases where it was deemed they had not previously received proper preparation and also had moved certain personnel into positions that were more appropriate given their skills and experience.

Cassidy said he was not satisfied with these answers and suggested they justified the budget cuts House appropriators have proposed to the chemical security program.

“When you haven’t laid off anybody … I wonder why we’re giving you any” money, Cassidy told the DHS officials.

However, House appropriators on Monday introduced a continuing resolution that would extend current funding levels for most federal programs for an additional six months beyond the end of the current fiscal year on Sept. 30. That indicates the chemical security initiative could for now avoid the $29.1 million in cuts that the lower chamber proposed earlier this year for fiscal 2013.