Library of Congress names new CIO

Bernard A. Barton Jr. is taking over the CIO post at the Library of Congress, effective Sept. 8. Barton comes to the library from the Department of Defense. Until recently, Barton was the CIO and deputy administrator of the Defense Technical Information Center, a repository of research and technical information.

“Mr. Barton brings to the Library of Congress the knowledge, expertise and leadership skills crucial to the institution’s mission of serving Congress and the American people in an age of rapidly evolving information technology," said Librarian James H. Billington. "He has a demonstrated, outstanding record of providing executive-level direction in the planning, implementation and evaluation of long-term information-technology operations and strategy."

The Library of Congress has been without a permanent CIO since 2012. A March 2015 Government Accountability report found that the library lacked a strategic plan for the deployment of its $119 million IT budget. Most recently, as FCW first reported, the Copyright Office, housed at the Library of Congress, suffered a week-long outage of its online copyright registration system as the result of an equipment failure that followed electrical maintenance. That system was back online Sept. 6, according to an LOC press release.