Congress will be busy with future tech initiatives and members have high hopes for the potential of current programs, according to two congressmen who spoke June 7 at MeriTalk’s Cloud Computing Brainstorm. Congressional IT leaders Reps. Will Hurd, R-Texas, and Gerry Connolly, D-Va., talked about the future of major IT initiatives such as FedRAMP, the Modernizing Government Technology (MGT) Act, FITARA, and executive leadership, offering insight into the shape of IT developments in the coming months. […]

Nine of the 24 agencies evaluated under the Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act are currently guided by acting chief information officers, raising the question of whether IT modernization efforts will be stalled. […]

The Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act scorecard should be embellished with yet another column indicating whether agencies have set up the rotating capital fund outlined in the Modernizing Government Technology Act, according to Karen Evans, national director for U.S. Cyber Challenge’s Center for Internet Security. […]

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Government is slowly working to modernize its legacy IT systems, with help from policies like FITARA and the Modernizing Government Technology Act, but government should consider the implications of leaving the IT business to the private sector, according to Roger Baker, former chief information officer for the Department of Veterans Affairs. […]

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The Department of Transportation’s F+ on the Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act scorecard does not reflect all of the agency’s compliance work, according to a DOT spokesperson who asked to remain anonymous. […]

Censeo Consulting Group worked with Cyrrus Analytics and Hettinger Strategy Group to create the report “FITARA at a Crossroads.” MeriTalk summarizes the 10 recommendations. […]

Sheila Yahyazadeh, senior consultant of KPMG’s Federal sector, said that Federal agencies’ disappointing scores on the FITARA report card could be an opportunity for learning and growth. […]

Tony Summerlin, who helped write FedRAMP, said he envisioned the program as a much quicker and sleeker version of what it is today. He says speed is one of the biggest challenges to Federal initiatives across the board, not just in the application of FedRAMP. […]

When Richard McKinney started his job as chief information officer of the Department of Transportation, he didn’t know what its network looked like. “Our network was the child of many hands,” McKinney said. “There was no overarching architectural approach to our network.” […]

FITARA addresses the following four areas: Incremental development, risk assessment transparency, IT portfolio review savings, and data center consolidation. How do these areas support cybersecurity actions? […]

The U.S. Department of Agriculture received a C grade on its Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act scorecard, which was released in May. Flip Anderson, acting executive director of FITARA for USDA, was so frustrated with the FITARA grading system that he created his own scorecard to gauge how closely the USDA complies with the act’s mandates. […]

Time may be running out on the Federal government’s plan to replace and modernize billions of dollars’ worth of legacy IT systems—some of which date back more than 40 years and control critical programs, including the U.S. military’s nuclear arsenal. […]

Proponents of the Digital Accountability and Transparency Act (DATA) worry that a change in presidential administration could derail the progress made to release Federal financial data to the public. […]

NASA’s progress meeting the requirements of FITARA has been anything but out of this world. Members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee voiced disappointment at the mediocre progress made by most agency chief information officers, but NASA, arguably the most high-tech of all Federal agencies, was the only one to receive an F. […]

Congress next week plans to hold a hearing on how Federal agencies are doing in their adherence to the Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act, known as FITARA, and the public will get its first look at the second round of agency grades. […]

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