OMB releases e-gov strategy

E-Government Strategy report

The Office of Management and Budget today released its E-Government Strategy report, which includes the first details on the implementation milestones for each of the 24 cross-agency e-government initiatives.

The report outlines the new cross-agency governance structure, led by OMB, which will allow the government to put the initiatives in place. It also details the process by which the interagency task force developed the initiatives last year. The 24 initiatives aim to improve service to individuals, businesses, within the federal government, and among federal, state, local and international agencies.

Many of the initiatives' services will be made available through the newly redesigned FirstGov Web site, which OMB and the General Services Administration also announced today.

The milestones set in the report will change or, more likely, will be added to as the initiatives evolve, said Mark Forman, assistant director for information technology and e-government at OMB.

Some of the dates are already set, such as the Federal Asset Sales initiative's goal to re-host the federal sales Web sites by March 31, 2002, develop pilot business integration by Sept. 30, 2002, and have a pilot transaction platform available by March 31, 2003.

Management teams are still finalizing other initiatives, so their program goals are set, but not milestone dates, Forman said. One such initiative is USA Service, which has goals that include enabling citizens to personalize the combination of services they obtain across multiple programs, enabling a case to be created and acted upon by multiple agencies, and implementing a multichannel contact center to facilitate easy access to information and service.

The milestones, which are based on the business cases developed by each management team, will be the method for holding the agencies accountable for the initiatives' performance, said Steve Perry, GSA's administrator.