Friday federal headlines – February 20, 2015

The Federal Headlines is a daily compilation of the stories you hear discussed on the Federal Drive and In Depth radio shows each day. Our headlines are updated twice per day — once in the morning and once in the afternoon — with the latest news affecting federal employees and contractors.

• The operation to retake Iraq’s second largest city from Islamic State militants will likely begin in April or May. A senior military official told the AP, it will involve about 12 Iraqi brigades. That comes to between 20,000 and 25,000 troops. The Central Command official said the force includes three Kurdish Peshmerga brigades. They would contain the Islamic State fighters from the north and west. A Mosul fighting force would move into the city once the Islamic State is driven out. That force would be made of former police officers and tribal fighters. (Federal News Radio)
• A former Army captain was sentenced to five years in prison for wire and mail fraud. Prosecutors said Michael Crowder operated a coin and precious metal business from his home. He took more than $1.2 million from customers, saying the money would be used to buy coins and precious metals. Instead, he used the money to purchase real estate. On top of his sentence, Crowder will have three years of supervised release and must pay $1.2 million in restitution. (Justice Department)
• A new research center will help local governments increase their resilience to natural disasters. The National Institute of Standards and Technology awarded $20 million for the Community Resilience Center of Excellence. It’s based in Fort Collins, Colorado. NIST will give $4 million a year to the center for five years. The agency can decide to renew for an additional five years. The goal of the center is help buildings withstand natural hazards, such as tornadoes, flooding and wildfires. The center will help with everything from preparing for anticipated disasters to recovering quickly when one happens. (Commerce Department)
• A revised plan would fit 3,000 more employees into the Homeland Security Department’s St. Elizabeths campus. That means 75 fewer square feet per person. The General Services Administration said the changes would save $800,000 over the old plan. And construction would finish five years earlier. The original St. Elizabeths plan came under fire in a Government Accountability Office report. Auditors said GSA and DHS had added $1 billion to the price tag. Under the revised plan, the total cost between the two agencies would be $3.7 billion. GSA would pay two-thirds of the cost. (Gov Exec )
• Agencies are winning awards for their “bright ideas” in innovation. Harvard University’s Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation is handing out the awards. The Ash Center said the awards recognized the best innovations in American government. The Veterans Affairs Department earned the most awards — three — and NASA took home two. Some of the programs included VA’s Warriors to Workforce program, which trains veterans to be contract specialists and the department’s Mobile Health apps. Other winning agencies included the State Department, Citizenship and Immigration Services, Environmental Protection Agency, Navy and Small Business Administration. (Harvard)
• Housing and Urban Development’s inspector general found the department let ineligible households live in subsidized housing, while other candidates remained on wait lists. Auditors said HUD paid $37 million a month to tenants who didn’t comply with federal guidelines. The rules required tenants to take part in programs, such as community service, job training or education. The IG said HUD doesn’t properly monitor if tenants abide by subsidy guidelines. The agency also doesn’t have a reporting system in place. Auditors warned if HUD didn’t strengthen its controls, it would pay $448 million over the next year to ineligible households. (Washington Post)
• The Pentagon’s press secretary is stepping down. Navy Rear Adm. John Kirby was chief spokesman while Chuck Hagel was defense secretary. Kirby’s resignation comes as Ash Carter takes over as defense secretary. Carter said he wants a civilian in the position of Pentagon spokesman. Kirbay has served as a Navy officer since 1986. (Federal News Radio)
• It’s been three months since the State Department confirmed hackers breached its unclassified email system. The hackers are still there. Bloomberg reports, State still hasn’t managed to purge them from its network. That’s according to sources who asked to remain anonymous. They say whenever IT staff changed settings, the hackers adjusted. Officials worry the hackers could generate emails of their own, or delete legitimate ones. The officials said the malware looks as if it originated in Russia. Stolen emails concern the crisis in Ukraine. (Bloomberg Government)
• The Veterans Affairs inspector general found mismanagement of claims records at the regional office in Oakland, California. Auditors said they were warned that 13,000 informal claims had not been processed. The calls for an investigation came from insiders and from Rep. Doug LaMalfa (R-Calif.). IG auditors eventually confirmed 537 unprocessed claims. And they found that records had been mishandled, with some stuffed into a file cabinet at a construction site. Some of the claims were made as far back as 2002. The IG recommended the regional director personally make sure the claims were dealt with properly. (Veterans Affairs)
• Legislation brewing in the Senate would placed sharp restrictions on how private companies can retaliate against cyber attacks. The Wall Street Journal reports the bill will be introduced soon by Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) and Sen. Diane Feinstein (D-Calif.) The main purpose of the bill is to foster cyber threat information sharing between companies and the federal government. It would restrict companies to an essentially defensive posture. One company would be able to help another during an attack. But the bill places no restrictions on the government launching cyber counter attacks. (Wall Street Journal)
• The IRS paid $5.8 billion to identity thieves in 2013. It recovered more than $24 billion. At least, it thinks so. The Government Accountability Offices found the IRS did a decent job of estimating how much it paid out in refunds to people using stolen identities. But GAO said there was room for improvement, like challenging its own assumptions in a more dynamic analysis. Auditors said the IRS should present a range of possible fraudulent payment levels to reflect the uncertainty in calculating these things. The agency answered, it would love to, if only it had the money and people to do so. (GAO)

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