Jason Miller covers civilian agencies in the federal government with a focus on technology and acquisition. He is also an executive editor at Federal News Radio. Jason's reports can be heard Monday - Friday on the Federal Drive and In Depth.

Baker leaving VA a transformed IT organization

Roger Baker's last day as the Veterans Affairs Department's assistant secretary for information and technology and chief information officer is March 8. He said the agency manages and oversees IT much differently than it did four years ago.
March 7, 2013

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CIO Council harnessing growing list of 'world class' IT programs

The CIO Council will add 25 more examples of IT project management excellence to its best practice database. DHS CIO Richard Spires said at the Excellence.gov awards Tuesday the goal of all of these success stories is to share what worked and leave a broader legacy across all of Federal IT.

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Issa asks agencies for alternative sequestration cuts

The chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee wrote to 17 agencies requesting short-term ways to achieve savings instead of the across-the-board cuts expected to start today.

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Graduate School USA bringing EA back into vogue

Brian Moran, a lecturer at the Graduate School USA, is leading an effort to reinvigorate the enterprise architecture curriculum.
February 28, 2013

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OMB directs agencies to stop most discretionary bonuses under sequestration

The administration issued new guidance late Wednesday detailing specific steps agencies should take as sequestration now is one-day away. Danny Werfel, OMB's controller, told agency leaders to place "increased scrutiny" around several personnel issues, including new hires, training, travel and conferences.

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IT reform bill needs to 'beef up' people section, experts say

Rep. Darrell Issa plans to formally introduce the Federal IT Acquisition Reform Act before the end of March. The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee held its second hearing on the draft bill. Current and former federal officials say the bill should place a stronger emphasis on project management and workforce issues.

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Before furloughs, agencies must negotiate terms with unions

Customs and Border Protection became one of the first civilian agencies to notify the union that represents their employees that they want to begin discussing the implementation of furloughs under sequestration. NTEU and AFGE expect to hear from more agencies in the next two weeks if cuts from sequestration go into effect March 1.

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Coburn calls for partial federal job freeze as sequestration nears

The Republican senator from Oklahoma is asking the Office of Management and Budget to require agencies to stop hiring for certain positions. Instead, he would like that funding put towards mission critical jobs that could be affected by sequestration cuts. Coburn, the ranking member of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, found 10 jobs listed on USAJobs.gov that he believes could be frozen. He says this would give agencies $1.4 million to spend on positions like border security officers and TSA screeners.

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OMB, agencies still crunching sequestration-related furlough numbers for non-DoD civilians

The White House released its estimate on the impact of cuts from sequestration would have on each state and the District of Columbia. OMB's Danny Werfel said they still are obtaining clarity on the impact $85 billion in cuts would have on each agency.

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Inside the Reporter's Notebook: OPM personnel changes, Tangherlini gets more than 210 days

News and buzz in the acquisition and IT communities that you may have missed this week.

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GSA cancels 2013 Expo conference

Budget uncertainty at the General Services Administration, other agencies and among vendors is the main cause behind the decision to call off the annual training conference, GSA officials said.

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OMB to test agency readiness to move to financial shared services

Danny Werfel, the OMB controller, will issue a new policy in the coming weeks that will mandate agencies simplify their requirements before upgrading their general ledger systems. The policy also will require agencies to strongly consider one of the four federal shared service providers. OMB said it has learned lessons from the previous attempts to move agencies into these common financial management infrastructures.

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OPM eases burden to hire people with disabilities

The agency will publish a final rule Friday that will remove the need for people with disabilities to have a "certification of job readiness."

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New metrics to help agencies determine value of social media

GSA led a 12-member interagency working group to create a set of measures specifically aimed at defining the usefulness of social media for agencies. The agency also released an API that lets users create tools to bring together government social media feeds in one place. Both tools are called for in the Digital Government Strategy.

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VA CTO Peter Levin to leave agency

Peter Levin, the Veterans Affairs chief technology officer, is leaving the agency. He follows Roger Baker, the agency's CIO and assistant secretary in the Office of Information and Technology, who resigned last week.

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Work time spent on union activities at a 7-year high for feds

OPM issued its fiscal 2011 Official Time report. The data shows employees, on average, spent 2.82 hours on union-related work during official hours. The cost of official time also increased by almost 12 percent.

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VA CIO Baker to resign

Roger Baker, VA's assistant secretary in the Office of Information and Technology, helped improve the agency's management of IT projects, implement mobile devices and continued to address cybersecurity.

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DHS, DoD among agencies making slow, steady progress to get off High Risk list

GAO adds two new areas to the list, NOAA's satellite programs and the federal government's financial risk because of climate change. Comptroller General Gene Dodaro said nearly every initiative on the list made progress in fixing their problems over the last two years.

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New data analytics tool gives Postal Service IG head start on cases

Bryan Jones, the director of the Counter Measures and Performance Evaluation (CAPE) team in the U.S. Postal Service's Office of the Inspector General, said the development of a dashboard to help investigators visualize data more easily helped overcome initial resistance to these kinds of tools.
February 14, 2013

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IRS program, interagency contracting finally removed from High-Risk list

A total of 30 programs, once again, are considered troubled, including two new areas. But, the Government Accountability Office removed the IRS' Business Systems Modernization program after 18 years on the list, and interagency contracting after 8 years.

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