Cira resigns as FEMA's CIO

Tony Cira, chief information officer at the Federal Emergency Management Agency, resigned Jan. 24 after 14 months on the job, the agency confirmed. Today was his last day.

Cira’s departure could signal the beginning of a few moves in the Homeland Security Department technology leadership.

DHS CIO Scott Charbo is rumored to be moving to the Transportation Security Administration as CIO. DHS Deputy CIO Charlie Armstrong also is rumored to be leaving headquarters sometime soon to go to a component agency.

A DHS spokeswoman told Federal Computer Week she has not heard of any changes in the main CIO office.

Cira’s decision to leave surprised many in industry. He had made progress with FEMA’s technology infrastructure as the agency was preparing to award a $1 billion contract to overhaul its information technology architecture and software.

Cira is joining Lockheed Martin’s missile division in California, sources said.

“Tony Cira has been a great asset to FEMA. All of us at FEMA regret losing Tony’s leadership, positive energy and guidance and we wish him the best in his future endeavors,” said James McIntyre, a FEMA spokesman.

Before becoming CIO, Cira was executive director of infrastructure operations at the DHS’ CIO office, where he was responsible for the daily operations of a large wide-area network for both classified and unclassified data. He also oversaw a global e-mail system, a data center and a LAN environment supporting the DHS executive staff.

He worked for AT&T from 1995 to 2004, for the Defense Information Systems Agency and for the Air Force in several locations.