Air Force declares its F-35 combat ready

The Federal Headlines is a daily compilation of the stories you hear discussed on  Federal Drive with Tom Temin.

• The day has finally come: The Air Force says its F-35 Lightning II is now combat ready. Commander of Air Combat Command Gen. Herbert “Hawk” Carlisle says the aircraft met all key criteria for reaching initial operational capability, and says it will be the most dominant aircraft in the Air Force’s inventory. The program has had issues in the past with cost overruns and delays since it began in 2001. Still, Chief of Staff of the Air Force Gen. David Goldfein said the aircraft will provide the nation with air dominance anywhere in the world. (Air Force)

• The Office of Personnel Management is taking a page from the military in the way it will train its cyber workforce. OPM Director Beth Cobert said she wants the cyber workforce structure to be modeled after the military. For example, she wants members to have status in their titles to make them understood and recognized. OPM recently released a cyber workforce strategy to try to draw more tech savvy employees to the government. (Federal News Radio)

• Don’t expect the familiar debates over spending caps in the Budget Control Act to die down with the next administration. Defense expert Todd Harrison said the new administration will have to rely on Congress again if it wants to make serious changes to the defense budget over the next five years. Spending caps under BCA end in fiscal 2021. Harrison said the Budget Control Act is the biggest challenge the next administration faces if it wants to add more defense or civilian funding. (Federal News Radio)

• The FAA has reported wild success in its program to register amateur-owned drones. Hobbyists registered 500,000 drones in the eight months since registration opened, Administrator Michael Huerta told the White House. The FAA’s next step is chartering an Unmanned Aircraft Safety Team modeled after the Commercial Aviation Safety Team. Huerta said the drone industry moves at Silicon Valley speed, so a drone advisory committee will be headed by Intel CEO Brian Krzanich. (Federal Aviation Administration)

• Rob Coen, the director of the National Institutes of Health’s IT Acquisition and Assessment Center (NITAAC), is moving to a new job. Coen decided to leave NITAAC after seven-plus years to take a new position at the General Services Administration’s Federal Systems Integration and Management Center or FedSIM. At FedSIM, Coen will lead a new sector that will emerge as part of the Federal Acquisition Service’s reorganization. Coen’s last day at NITAAC is Aug. 19. (Federal News Radio)

• A 4th quarter spending spree on computers is about to begin. Civilian agencies are getting ready to do a massive buy of laptop and desktop computers under the category management initiative. The IT category leaders are organizing a fourth-quarter procurement from the three governmentwide contracts OMB designated as the only place to buy computers from back in October. OMB also will be holding agencies accountable in a new dashboard for using these three contracts, NASA’s SEWP, the GSA IT schedule and NIH’s CIO-CS. The dashboard will track agency progress in meeting the goals of several requirements under category management.

• Agencies get instructions from the White House on how to calculate what effect their actions have climate change. The Council on Environmental Quality will help agencies quantify greenhouse gas emissions when conducting National Environmental Policy Act reviews. The guidance also reminds agencies to use existing science when deciding on proposed actions. (The White House)

• A new report from the House Homeland Security Committee Majority Staff said Homeland Security components don’t keep or share enough information to track data on property the agency has. DHS headquarters has a tough time keeping track of its entire real estate portfolio. The committee said DHS components rarely work with each other to consolidate unused or underused office space. (House Committee on Homeland Security)

• A Maryland congressman is now enlisting the help of federal watchdogs to get answers on rising insurance premiums. Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) is asking the ranking members of the House Oversight Committee to hold an investigative hearing on the structure of the long term care insurance program, as well as the contract’s renewal. Premiums are predicted to rise an average of 83 percent. (Rep. Chris Van Hollen)

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