Senate News 
Top News
- Contractors with security clearances lack path to report problems
- Proposed commission would give teeth to cost-saving ideas but some lawmakers skeptical
- Feds outside the Beltway react to furloughs
- Contracting executives guilty of 8(a) program fraud
- EPA CIO Jackson returning to private sector
- Navy strikes enterprise licensing deal with Oracle
- 29-year-old NASA engineer going where no one has gone before
- USPS reaches energy reduction goal ahead of schedule
- NOAA meteorologist helps save lives one storm at a time
- ICE Director John Morton stepping down
- NASA picks 8 new astronauts, 4 of them women
- House passes sweeping $638 billion defense bill
- NIH tops list of best companies for baby boomers
- Latest postal reform proposal OKs 5-day delivery
- IRS official contradicts claims about reviews
- House presses VA for more details after cyber attacks
- DoD maintains BRAC fight, despite opposition
Congress News
- Proposed commission would give teeth to cost-saving ideas but some lawmakers skeptical
- House passes sweeping $638 billion defense bill
- FBI director gets another House grilling
- DoD maintains BRAC fight, despite opposition from Congress
- Lawmakers, industry press OFPP not to make strategic sourcing mandatory
Library of Congress unveils new website
Congress unveiled a new search engine Wednesday to help politicos, lobbyists, researchers, students and any other interested citizens find legislation working its way through the House and Senate to become new laws.
Pay and Benefits Tracker
Congress is turning to federal pay and benefits to find cost savings. To sort out all the proposals for you, Federal News Radio compiled a list of the bills that could affect your compensation. This list will be updated regularly with status changes and the addition of new bills.
Sen. Wyden reminds White House to limit scope of cyber order
The Select Committee on Intelligence member wrote a letter to White House Cyber Coordinator Michael Daniel asking him to make sure any mandate doesn't harm the networks used for interactive computer services.
GSA praised for steps to reform culture, organization
Senate lawmakers and the agency's Inspector General say the strategy to reorganize the General Services Administration and make it more accountable is on the right track. Acting Administrator Dan Tangherlini said he will consolidate IT and HR across the agency, and reduce contracting fees charged by the Federal Acquisition Service.
GSA to centralize oversight of IT, HR after top-to-bottom review
Acting Administrator Dan Tangherlini will tell Senate lawmakers today about his plans to continue reforming the agency in the aftermath of the Western Regions Conference scandal. Along with consolidating CIO and human resources offices, Tangherlini wants the Federal Acquisition Service to reduce its fees. Federal News Radio has obtained an exclusive copy of Tangherlini's testimony.
Six-month CR makes extension of fed pay freeze official
The six-month stopgap spending bill unveiled by the House Appropriations Committee this week officially continues the federal pay freeze until at least March. The continuing resolution, which runs through March 27, gives lawmakers more time to make appropriations for the coming year and staves off the threat of a government shutdown. When a broad CR was first announced last month, the full Congress had not yet approved any fiscal 2013 spending bills. President Barack Obama proposed last month a 0.5 percent pay raise that would only take effect once Congress passed a 2013 budget — a de facto extension of the current two-year freeze. The CR makes the extension official.
13 defense executives bemoan uncertainty of cuts
Defense industry executives criticize the impending sequestration, which they say would lead to the loss of more than 1 million defense-related jobs.
Congress faces continuing resolution, sequestration and postal reform
Lawmakers returned to Washington, D.C., this week with a packed agenda. Topping the list of priorities is hammering out final details of a stopgap spending measure to keep the government running beyond the end of the fiscal year -- Sept. 30. Amid the election-year politicking, the list of unfinished business also includes legislation to restructure the financially ailing U.S. Postal Service and a cybersecurity bill that aims to safeguard the nation's critical infrastructure. Perhaps looming largest of all is what Congress plans to do about automatic, across-the-board cuts, known as sequestration, set to take effect Jan. 2. Failure to avert the cuts could send the country over a "fiscal cliff," budget experts warn.
White House misses deadline to deliver sequestration report, says plan coming next week
The White House plans to deliver a report to Congress late next week detailing how automatic, across-the-board cuts, set to take effect in January, will affect specific programs. The report is required under the Sequestration Transparency Act, which Congress overwhelmingly passed this summer and which the President signed on Aug. 7. The law directed the President to issue the detailed report within 30 days of signing it - a deadline that came this week and went unmet.
Senate committee questions GSA IG about investigation tactics
In a routine pre-hearing briefing call, Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee staff members asked Brian Miller about his staff's decision to knock on a GSA employee's door after 11 p.m. at the SmartPay conference last month. Miller and acting GSA Administrator Dan Tangherlini are scheduled to testify Sept. 12 before the committee on changes the agency has made in light of the conference spending scandals.
Democrats urge immediate repair of Capitol Dome
Senate Democrats are calling for $61 million to fix the U.S. Capitol Dome, which has fallen into disrepair and has at least 1,300 cracks in it. Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) calls the state of the dome a "national embarrassment."
OMB: Spending bills exceed budget caps, could trigger cuts
Spending levels appropriated by Congress, so far, for fiscal 2013 fail to live within the limits set by last year's Budget Control Act (BCA), the Office of Management and Budget said in a report issued Monday. If Congress fails to adhere to the annual limits, OMB is required to enact automatic cuts to bring them back into balance, Acting OMB Director Jeffrey Zients wrote in a letter to President Barack Obama that preceded OMB's report.
Senators sound defense budget alarm in North Vegas
A trio of Republican senators sounded the alarm over billions of dollars' worth of "catastrophic" and "draconian" military budget cuts set to take effect in January, telling an audience Monday that more time was needed for negotiations.
Senators ask DoD to consider debarment for P&WC
Sens. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.) sent a letter to the Defense Secretary Panetta and Secretary of State Clinton asking them to consider further actions against contractor Pratt & Whitney Canada. P&WC pleaded guilty in June to illegally exporting military software to China.
Obama may act to stop infrastructure cyberattacks
President Barack Obama may use his authority to issue orders compelling or encouraging private industry to meet minimum security standards to protect their computer networks from attacks by hackers or foreign governments, White House counterterrorism adviser John Brennan said Wednesday.
Major changes to performance management in OMB budget guidance
The White House issued the updated Circular A-11 guidance for the 2014 budget development. The performance management section includes some of the most significant changes. In an exclusive interview with Federal News Radio, OMB's Shelley Metzenbaum said agencies have a multi-year plan to improve programs and accountability.
Senate fails to approve cybersecurity legislation
The Senate failed Thursday to pass legislation to protect the U.S. electrical grid, water supplies and other critical industries from cyberattack and electronic espionage, despite dire warnings from top national security officials about the potential for devastating assaults on American computer networks.
Debate over private sector role stymies Senate cyber bill
A battle over the role companies should play in keeping the U.S. safe from cyber attacks threatens to kill cybersecurity legislation in the Senate
Bill to cut Senate confirmations gets final action
The House gave final congressional approval Tuesday to a bill that would save the slow-paced Senate some time by eliminating the need for confirming nominees to some 170 executive branch jobs and 3,000 military officer positions.
OMB to begin planning for sequestration
Faced with congressional inaction in averting looming across-the-board cuts that take effect in January, the Office of Management and Budget will begin meeting with agency leaders to discuss how the cuts will be implemented. In a memo to agency heads, OMB Director Jeff Zients said his office will consult with agencies to determine which budget accounts and programs are exempt from sequestration.
