The House Government Operations Subcommittee has scheduled a hearing for April 16 at 9:30 a.m. to examine compliance with the Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act (FITARA).
Witnesses at the hearing will include: Gundeep Ahluwalia, CIO at the Labor Department (DoL); Jay Mahanand, CIO at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID); and Kevin Walsh, director of information technology and cybersecurity issues at the Government Accountability Office (GAO). DoL earned a “B-minus” grade on the last FITARA Scorecard, while USAID got a “B.”
The April 16 hearing follows the late December release by the full House Oversight and Reform Committee of the 11th version of its FITARA Scorecard, which grades the 24 largest Federal agencies across nine categories – some rooted in law and others in policy – to gauge their progress in improving IT operations.
On the committee’s Scorecard 11.0, three of the 24 CFO Act agencies earned higher grades, five agencies slipped, and the rest held steady since the prior grading period in mid-2020.
The Government Operations Subcommittee generally holds hearings on new editions of the FITARA Scorecard shortly after they are issued. But the 11th version of the scorecard was released just before Christmas, and subcommittee Chairman Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., said earlier this year that he wanted to give the Biden administration a chance to “find its depth” on Federal agency tech issues before the next hearing was scheduled.
The April 16 hearing will be held in a hybrid fashion, from the Rayburn House Office Building, Room 2154, and virtually via WebEx.
