Could Element Groups speed up driill filtering???

I'm securing activities. The logic I am using follows:

1. Check to make sure that ACACTIVITY.VAR_LEVELS isn't blank. If blank ('') then NO ACCESS...Else
2. Look at a user attribute for company, it matches positions wxyz in the VAR_LEVELS <Meaning the person has company wide access> Grant All.
3. Look at another user attribute, compare it against a structure set up in RM (using getStructNodeAbove) to look for a unique code, and if that name or code matches what is in the user attribute GRANT ALL.
4. Otherwise, Grant NONE.

For the most part, this works. With only 4000 activities and perhaps 200 in the initial build actually having VAR_LEVELS populated, it is slower than watching the grass grow. Could ELEMENT groups speed it up? Any suggestions about things NOT to do would be most appreciated. I'm performing the least number of lookups / queries possible and no matter how I rework this, well, it is just plain sloooow.

Thanks!