Online government grant application

Byline: Cynthia L. Webb

President Bush's e-government "czarina," Karen Evans , answered citizen questions in an online discussion yesterday sponsored by the White House. The occasion? Evans was helping to mark the one-year anniversary of the E-Gov Act , legislation that is designed to cut red tape and make it easier for the government to communicate with citizens.

During her online question and answer session, Evans noticeably did not get questions about Congress's failure to fully fund the administration's planned e-government efforts. However, she did outline what some of the e-government successes have been: " FirstGov.gov is the gateway to the government and has over 6 million visitors a month. Most recently FirstGov.gov launched FirstGov.gov in Espanol to provide government information in Spanish. IRS Free File initiative which allowed 2.8 million taxpayers to file their taxes on line last filing season. GoLearn.gov is considered the number one most visited on-line training site in the world. GovBenefits.gov provides access to more than $2 trillion in federal benefit dollars on-line. And most recently, Grants.gov , which allows federal grant customers to search and obtain information on over 900 grant programs from 29 federal agencies." More e-gov achievements are listed at www.whitehouse.gov/omb/egov .

Federal Computer Week ran a review of the E-Government Act this week. Excerpt: "[O]bservers are questioning the impact of the law. For many, it simply conveys the message that e-government is a priority. For others, the law should -- or at least could -- help shape e-government now and in the future," the article said. "Several areas have received intense focus. As the act requires, agency officials are filing regular reports to the Office of Management and Budget that assess their progress on ensuring the privacy and security of their data and systems. And OMB has created a permanent e-government position. But privacy and security were already near the top of the Bush administration's agenda, and a de facto e-government leader was already in place." The article concluded that while progress has been made, there is still a lot of work yet to meet e-government goals.

Money Chase

E-government may be a top White House priority, but the small amount appropriated by Congress for e-gov efforts in fiscal year 2004 continues to worry some lawmakers and constituents alike.

Republican Rep. Tom Davis of Northern Virginia, chair of the House Government Reform Committee, was asked by a reader on a Government Computer News online discussion yesterday why his committee hasn't done more to ensure that e-government appropriations are in line with goals set forth in the e-gov law enacted last year. His reply: "Good point! I speak for the dozen of other authorizers in the House, who often look at the Appropriations Committee and wonder why certain things are done. On E-Government issues, there is no political constituency pushing appropriators to allocate money. They see no political benefit for putting money into E-Gov projects and taking away money from projects which they see as hometown accolades or campaign contributions."

Davis continued: "Moreover, our Committee has been lax in exercising its jurisdiction over the appropriators over the last several Congresses. We are changing this but it takes to time to readjust appropriators' attitudes. We literally stuck two dozen authorizing provisions on an appropriations bill because appropriators had not consulted with us and will continue to do so until the relationship improves. This is a constant issue in the House but is less of an issue in the Senate where the authorizers and the appropriators are often the same people."

Evans was online with me on washingtonpost.com in October to talk about e-government and other issues. When asked how her office plans to be effective with the funding shortfall, she replied, "There is no funding shortfall. We have nearly $60 billion in information technology spending among the Federal agencies. The goal is to spend this money more wisely both within and across agencies. Certainly, the E-Gov fund would allow us to quickly bring agencies together around citizen-centered technology solutions and is an important Administration initiative to which we remain committed. However, given that Congress has thus far funded the E-Gov fund at a lower amount we have the opportunity to focus more on cross-agency collaboration through existing investments."

States Embrace E-Gov Too

On Monday, Virginia Gov. Mark Warner (D) launched a Web site taxreform.governor.virginia.gov that "he said will allow every Virginian to instantly calculate how much they would save, or pay, if his proposed tax plan is passed by the General Assembly next year," The Washington Post reported. "Virginia residents who browse to that site can plug in personal information: their birth date, their annual income, their deductions, the number of children they have, how many cars they own and how much they smoke. With the click of a button, the Web site reveals whether the person is better off or not under the governor's proposed plan."

Now, this sounds a bit like old-fashioned politicking, instead of a strict e-government play, but it's one example of how state leaders are using the 'Net to reach constituents. The Fredericksburg Free-Lance Star reported yesterday that more than 7,500 people used the tax calculator tool on the Web site since its debut on Monday.

A Coup For High-Tech Army Unit

The 4th Infantry Division ( www.4thinfantry.org ), the unit credited with helping nab Saddam Hussein over the weekend, is billed as the Army's first "high-tech" division. Capturing the ousted Iraqi leader "should justify the Army's spending in 2004 of almost $420 million to update the rest of III Corps with the newest weapons and computer systems, said military and industry officials," Federal Computer Week reported. Association of the United States Army 's Ted Stroup told FCW that the unit's role in the capture might make it easier for the Army to win more support for further modernization.

"The Army in October announced it would take servicewide its multibillion-dollar digitization initiative, which aims to give troops access to battlefield data through computers in their vehicles. The 4th Infantry's capture of Hussein should give the Army Battle Command System more credibility when the Army starts delivering the system's version 6.4 to all forces next spring, said an industry official familiar knowledgeable of the service's communications programs," FCW said.

The Boston Globe featured a piece this week on the 4th's roots: "Although it has a storied history like many Army units -- it dates back to World War I, saw its first action in Europe in 1918, and its Eighth Infantry Regiment was the first allied unit to assault the Normandy coast in World War II -- the Fourth ID is unique in the modern Army. It is the first-ever 'networked division,' meant to be the cutting edge of a revamped Army. It is labeled the 'EXFOR,' or experimental force, and all of the division's vehicles are linked by computer. Commanders and soldiers have unprecedented clarity on where their allies are and where the enemy is. They are the first unit in Iraq to get the Army's Strykers -- lightly armored, highly mobile vehicles using speed and information superiority to overwhelm their enemy."

Modernizing the Supply Chain

All shipments of military supplies will be tracked with a high-tech barcode by 2005 if the Pentagon gets its wish. The Department of Defense is tasking its suppliers to use the technology to track goods, using radio frequency identification, Washington Post technology columnist Shannon Henry wrote today . "It's a higher-tech version of bar codes, using tags that have wireless antennas that can be placed on individual items or large cases of merchandise. The technology is supposed to improve a company's (or government's) bottom line by smoothing the 'supply chain.' If the technology works, say advocates, products arrive on time, get where they're supposed to and are easily trackable along the way. At the moment, the two main companies developing RFID technology are Alien Technology of Morgan Hill, Calif., and Matrics of Columbia [Md.], according to Assistant Deputy Undersecretary of Defense Alan Estevez , who is promoting the technology in the Defense Department," Henry wrote.

How Long Can It Last?

Government IT contractors have been merging and buying each other in a frenzied rush to get bigger faster, but the hot government IT market is not going to last forever. The Washington Post looked at the M&A trend in the government IT sector and how the 65 IT companies that were bought by larger companies last year and 64 so far this year might be the lucky ones.