Some agencies slip in otherwise stagnant FITARA scorecard
Three agencies have managed to improve compliance with the Federal IT Acquisition Reform Act in the past months, but six somehow got worse. This leaves the majority stagnant once again in the biannual FITARA scorecard.
This fifth scorecard, issued by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, shows agency adherence to the component pieces of the 2014 law. Key elements include data center optimization and governmentwide software license usage — it also gives federal chief information officers increased budget authority and accountability. The latest scorecard is linked below.
This is the first scorecard to officially include compliance with FITARA and the MEGABYTE Act for software licensing — and17 agencies received an “F” under that section.
The U.S. Agency for International Development remains the standout of the bunch as the only agency with an “A” grade. USAID became the first agency to get an “A” this past June.
The bulk of the agencies are in the “C” range, with the departments of Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development and Justice, and the Environmental Protection Agency having fallen there from “B” grades in June. The Department of Energy also slipped — falling from a “C”to a “D.”
And while the Department of Defense was the only “F” last time, the Department of Transportation now joins the bottom of the rankings.
The House Subcommittee on Government Operations and Subcommittee on IT will call a joint hearing on the new scorecard on Wednesday, and the agenda is packed. Max Everett, CIO of the Department of Energy, will appear on a panel along with agency’s acting Chief Financial Officer Alison Doone, Director of Acquisition Management John Bashista, Associate Director of Advanced Scientific Computer Research Barbara Helland and the Government Accountability Office’s Dave Powner.
A second panel will feature Jay Mahanand, CIO of USAID, agency CFO Reginald Mitchell and acting Deputy Administrator Wade Warren. Powner will testify on this panel too.
The third and final panel will include Maria Roat, CIO of the Small Business Administration, with agency CFO Tim Gribben, Deputy Administrator Althea Coetzee Leslie and, again, Powner.
Rep. Will Hurd, R-Texas, said recently that as the chair of the IT Subcommittee, he would continue to call struggling CIOs and their CFO and deputy administrator colleagues to grill them on their failure to adhere to the now three-year-old law.
“FITARA really is a good piece of legislation for giving the CIO powers they need,” Hurd said in September. “But they don’t have complete control over what happens in their organization. So, [we’re going to use the MGT Act] to continue to shine a light on that, and bringing the CFO and the deputy agency head or the agency head to ask these questions is a way to force that the senior leaders of the organization understand modernization.”
