Rebecca Carroll

Under Further Scrutiny, Obamacare Website Gets CEO

Kevin Counihan has been named the first CEO of Healthcare.gov, which serves residents of states that opted not to create their own online insurance marketplaces.

Counihan was CEO of Connecticut’s health insurance exchange, which is one of the most successful state marketplaces and the first to exceed enrollment goals laid out in the health care law.

In his new role, Counihan will manage relationships with state exchanges and run an oversight center, HHS said. He will report to Marilyn Tavenner, the administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which oversees HealthCare.gov.

House Approves Stronger Cyber Protections For Critical Infrastructure

Two bills to strengthen cybersecurity in the systems that underlie the nation’s energy, water and food supplies passed the House, along with a measure to improve the federal government's cyber workforce.

A bill (H.R. 3696) introduced by Rep Michael McCaul (R-TX) seeks to strengthen the Department of Homeland Security's ability to protect 16 critical sectors -- including defense, health, energy and food -- by establishing partnerships with the private sector and enhancing programs already in place.

Other legislation passed by the House included a bill (H.R. 2952) introduced by Rep Patrick Meehan (R-PA) to improve critical-infrastructure security technology and a bill (H.R. 3107) from Rep Yvette Clarke (D-NY) to bolster DHS’ cyber workforce.

House Passes Federal IT Reform Yet Again, This Time With Defense Bill

A fundamental overhaul of how federal agencies build and buy information technology systems passed the House for the second time in 2014.

The chamber in February approved the Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act, or FITARA, which among other reforms would limit each federal agency -- including the Defense Department -- to one person with the title chief information officer and give that person authority over the agency’s IT spending.

This time around, the legislation was tacked on as an amendment to the 2015 National Defense Authorization Act, which the House approved by a vote of 326-98.

A similar measure made it into the Defense bill in November 2013 but was stripped out at the last minute in the following month, when lawmakers also cut more controversial amendments -- including one addressing sexual assault in the military -- to ensure the bill would pass both the House and the Senate.

Agencies Often Don’t Answer Questions They Get Via Social Media, Survey Finds

Agencies only answer 72 percent of the questions citizens ask via social media, according to a new survey. Information services firm JD Power determined that 30 percent of social media contacts with government are to ask a question or resolve a problem.

But agencies respond to only 72 percent of those queries, the survey found. “Obviously there’s a lot of opportunity or room for improvement,” said JD Power’s Greg Truex, who managed the study. “Because they are reaching out with a specific question -- and with social media being a growing channel for citizens to reach out -- 72 percent does seem a bit low.”

IT Reform Should Focus More On Outcomes Than Tactics, Vanroekel Says

With information technology evolving faster than laws governing federal contracting, legislation to reform how government buys and builds IT should focus more on results than on specific methods of achieving them, the federal chief information officer told lawmakers.

We should be thinking about "what kinds of outcomes we’re trying to drive versus what are the tactical ways we’re going to get these,” federal CIO Steven VanRoekel said at a hearing of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, where panelists discussed the most successful approaches to IT contracting.

“Many of the best practices you see here are really about comprehensive management, and that’s probably the hardest thing to legislate,” he said. VanRoekel issued 2014 guidance for PortfolioStat, an initiative launched in 2012 to help agencies assess how they’re managing their IT portfolios.

The latest memo asks agencies to build on previous efforts to gauge and report key performance indicators, with a new focus on “high impact” investments -- guidance VanRoekel cited as an example of what he’s done to encourage agencies to develop IT projects incrementally.

State Needs Smartphones for The World Cup, The Pan Am Games And The 2016 Olympics

The State Department wants Samsung Galaxy S4 smartphones to use at the 2014 Brazil World Cup, the 2015 Pan American Games in Toronto, and the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Summer Olympics, according to contracting documents.

The phones need to have 3G and 4G mobile capabilities. They also need a good map app (to get around foreign cities, presumably) and videoconferencing (to capture and relay the action back home).

“Extensive research was done to find a phone that is compatible with both applications and can be used in both Brazil and Canada,” the solicitation said.

The Galaxy S4 was chosen partly for its antennae, which are compatible with 3G networks in both nations. But anything that’s exactly the same as the Galaxy S4 will do, according to the solicitation, which requests this model “or equal.”