Digital Government
Spectrum battles mire Defense in budget & safety straits (Part 1 of 2)
If Defense Department cost estimates hold true, about half of the revenue Congress expects to obtain through the latest round of auctions of the radio spectrum now used by federal agencies will be lost because DOD will spend the funds to reallocate its systems to other areas of the spectrum. The Co
Digital Government
Y2K costs could sap Clinton's technology budget requests
Major information technology initiatives in President Clinton's fiscal 1999 budget proposal, which was released this month, may be trimmed back by Capitol Hill appropriators as Congress focuses dollars on a the Year 2000 problem.
Digital Government
Spectrum battles mire Defense in budget & safety straits (Part 2 of 2)
Defense Department officials have confirmed that last fall the United States came perilously close to losing its hold on a portion of the radio spectrum used for Global Positioning System transmissions.
Digital Government
CIO Council tackles IT staffing shortage
The Education and Training Committee of the federal CIO Council last month kicked off an effort to address the problems agencies face in recruiting and retaining information technology workers. Glenn Sutton, vice chairman of the committee and deputy chief information officer at the Office of Person
Digital Government
Profile: Private sector is no culture shock for Woods
One might expect Bob Woods, who has spent much of his life as a civil servant, to experience a severe case of culture shock after leaving government service for a privatesector job as the president and chief operating officer of Federal Sources Inc.
Digital Government
High-speed connectivity wares unveiled
Highspeed localarea networking technology took center stage at last week's ComNet '98 show, as vendors introduced new cabling systems, routers and switches. 3M Corp. unveiled a new fiberoptic cabling system that the company said will cut in half the cost of laying fiber to the desktop.
Digital Government
Hill mulls new guidelines
The staffs of House and Senate oversight committees began work this month on legislation that would set guidelines for competition between government agencies and industry for federal contracts. A staff member on the Senate Committee for Governmental Affairs said members hope to produce language th
Digital Government
Marines choose Ancor for a few good switches
Ancor Communications Inc. this month announced a deal with Litton Systems Inc. to introduce fibre channel communications technology into the Defense Department's command and control systems. The Marine Corps awarded a contract to Litton to upgrade the Marines' militaryspecification equipment for t
Digital Government
GSA tests Internet-based buying system
The General Services Administration's Pacific Rim regional office expects to conclude tests this month of an Internetbased system that will electronically funnel information technology requirements from agencies to vendors holding contracts with the region. Joe Ilagan former acquisition service di
Digital Government
Katzen to leave OIRA post
Sally Katzen administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs at the Office of Management and Budget announced last week that she will leave the agency for a White House job as the deputy director of the National Economic Council. Although Katzen has served in her current position
Digital Government
Decker makes a career of battling bureaucracy
Ron Decker's career illustrates how the efforts of forward-thinking federal employees often are stymied by bureaucracy and turf issues. But it also shows how persistence can force these new ideas to ultimately take hold and change things for the better.
Digital Government
New sked plan boosts online buys
General Services Administration officials plan to issue this week a solicitation that would merge all the information technology schedules into a single program while placing new requirements on vendors, including a controversial measure to require that all IT products be available on the GSA Advantage electronic commerce (EC) system.
Digital Government
GSA sizes up competition for local telecom services
Local telecommunications providers and longdistance carriers alike are for the first time preparing to compete for the same federal contracts and are putting together their responses to the General Services Administration's Metropolitan Area Acquisition for telephone service in dozens of major cit
Digital Government
ODIN opens to all feds
The General Services Administration and NASA will sign an agreement this week opening the Outsourcing Desktop Initiative for NASA (ODIN) contract to all government agencies and increasing its value up to $5 billion from almost $1 billion. Originally ODIN was intended to outsource hardware software
Digital Government
Network users wrestle with ATM option
Unlike most technologies Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) networking has been one that the federal government adopted earlier than most commercial users. Today one can scarcely point to any federal agency that has not at least experimented with the technology. For years ATM vendors have trumpeted t
Digital Government
GAO blasts DOD for mismanaging program
The General Accounting Office reported late last month that the Defense Department has not adequately controlled its $18 billion fiveyear plan to eliminate nearly 2 000 duplicative computer systems and has wasted hundreds of millions of dollars on the effort. In 1993 DOD offices selected 363 'migr
Digital Government
ATF awards leasing pact to Unisys
The Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms last month awarded a blanket purchase agreement for seat management services worth up to $30 million to Unisys Corp.'s Federal Systems Division. A Unisys spokesman said the company will provide equipment and services including PCs notebooks printers server
Digital Government
DOD Supply launches BPA barrage
The Defense Supply ServiceWashington has quietly awarded a series of blanket purchase agreements covering a range of information technology products and services open to more than 320 DOD agencies. Although DSSW officials have not attached dollar values to any of the four BPAs awarded so far obse
Digital Government
Air Force, Navy apply brakes to additional BPAs
The Air Force and the Navy late last month stemmed the proliferation of blanket purchase agreements (BPAs) on General Services Administration schedules by restricting the number of new deals that service personnel can initiate. The Air Force's action Oct. 24 was the most drastic suspending the crea
Digital Government
Hill moves to halt border-crossing system
A bipartisan panel of nine senators and congressional representatives last week voiced their support of legislation that would freeze an effort by the Immigration and Naturalization Service to install an automated system to keep track of individuals crossing U.S. borders with Canada and Mexico. The
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