Furlough notices will now be sent to employees in early May. Actual furloughs will begin in mid-to-late June, placing most Defense civilians on unpaid leave roughly one day per week for the final seven pay periods of the fiscal year.
Under a revised strategy for creating an interagency e-health record, VA will use its current system, VistA. The department believes DoD should adopt it too.
The Pentagon will sharply cut the number of unpaid furlough days civilians will be forced to take over the next several months from 22 to 14. According to defense officials, Secretary Chuck Hagel made the decision Wednesday. DoD said last week it would review its furlough plan after Congress shifted more than $10 billion to military operations and maintenance accounts as part of the bill funding agencies through the remainder of 2013.
AFGE's J. David Cox, and Federal Times Senior Writer Sean Reilly will talk about the impact of sequestration and the possiblity that federal workers will be furloughed. March 27, 2013
Defense budget watchers say despite abundant evidence to the contrary, the Pentagon appears to believe it will eventually get most of its funding wishes over the coming few years. "Whether [sequestration] stays in place for nine more years is an open question, but it's certainly going to be in place for the foreseeable future," said Mackenzie Eaglen, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
News and buzz in the acquisition and IT communities that you may have missed this week.
In 2006, the service aimed to cut its fuel use by 10 percent. By 2012, it had reduced consumption by 12 percent.
After passage of the 2013 funding bill earlier today, the Pentagon is reassessing its need for civilian furloughs. The Defense Department said it will delay issuance of furlough notices to its 780,000 civilian workers for two weeks. DoD had originally planned to begin sending out furlough notices today.
The Defense Department released an updated time table on civilian employee furloughs, including dates when furlough notices will go out and when furloughs are set to begin.
Officials aim to redefine operational series codes for civilian cybersecurity workers and offer more pay for additional expertise. The Air Force would like to create an elite cadre of civilian cyber warriors.
DoD said it is tightening-up governance over its large business IT systems, looking for indicators of future failure and forcing resource sponsors to justify their needs before projects begin. Elizabeth McGrath, DoD's deputy chief management officer, told House lawmakers the Pentagon is working on data quality and changing business processes to avoid previous problems.
Jim Craft, the CIO of the Joint Improvised Explosive Device Defeat Organization (JIEDDO), said the culture of taking appropriate risk to get technology to soldiers is making a huge difference in saving lives. March 14, 2013 (Part two of interview airs March 21, 2013)
The Army expects to mostly finish the migration to enterprise email by the end of this month. The Air Force and the Navy begin pilot tests using the cloud applications.
U.S. Cyber Command is putting together dozens of groups to defend the military's network, to work with combatant commanders on offensive tactics and to respond to attacks against the nation. Gen. Keith Alexander, however, said budget cuts will delay DoD's ability to recruit and train team members.
The Pentagon's acquisition chief said he's planning day-to-day, not year-to-year because of sequestration's indiscriminate cuts and political uncertainty over DoD's budget. In 2014, there will be more opportunities to prioritize, but spending reductions also will lead to cancellation of contracts and downsizing of the military and civilian workforce.