Federal Drive with Tom Temin

Last year’s cybersecurity executive order was mostly focused on federal civilian agencies. But don't think the Biden administration will let defense and intelligence agencies off the hook. He signed a new national security directive yesterday with some updated cyber requirements for classified systems. For more, Federal News Network’s Justin Doubleday. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In-person hearings are coming back to the Social Security Administration. SSA and the Association of Administrative Law Judges reached an agreement on that point. But video and phone hearings will still be an option this year. Judges over the past two years have held hundreds of thousands of tele-hearings since the start of the pandemic. For more, Federal News Network’s Jory Heckman spoke with AALJ’s president, Som Ramprup Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Humanitarian groups often swoop in around the world to help people hit by natural disasters. Now the U.S. Agency for International Development has launched a program to see if people can be saved before disasters. It's funding a consortium of seven universities around the world to explore the possibilities. Joining the Federal Drive with the details, from USAID's Bureau of Humanitarian Assistance, the acting division chief for private sector engagement, diaspora and innovation Maggie Schmitz. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For nearly a dozen years, the Energy Department has been sustaining carbon capture demonstration projects at process and power plants. But the program has been rocky. DOE canceled some projects before they were built. Others started but were shut down. The Government Accountability Office has found that Energy hasn't done enough to ensure cost controls and ended up spending $500 million on projects that were never built. For details, the Federal Drive with Tom Temin turned to the GAO's Director of Natural Resources and Environment Issues Frank Rusco. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A former Bush White House official is hoping to turn around a key Homeland Security division for the Biden administration. Kenneth Wainstein has been nominated to lead DHS’ Office of Intelligence and Analysis. If confirmed, he’ll have to take on the division’s long-standing leadership and morale issues. For more, Federal News Network’s Justin Doubleday spoke to the Federal Drive with Tom Temin. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Postal Service hopes to deliver a billion COVID-19 tests to U.S. homes in the coming weeks. Starting today, people can request them at a new federal web site. Tests are supposed to ship within 12 days of ordering. Behind the scenes, USPS is striking a deal with one of its unions to help carry out this work. Federal News Network’s Jory Heckman has been following this development and joined the Federal Drive with Tom Temin for the latest. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Department of Housing and Urban Development is expanding a partnership with several Health and Human Services agencies. Now they've launched an entity called the Housing Services Resource Center. It's all aimed at ensuring people with disabilities can get the type of housing they need. For details, HUD's Senior Adviser for Housing and Services Richard Cho joined Federal Drive with Tom Temin. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Top planners in the Pentagon and in the armed services have talked for years about the need to obtain innovation from small business. But according to my next guest, would-be companies new to the Defense market say that have trouble getting an audience, much less a contract. And that has implications beyond the small companies themselves. Federal sales and marketing consultant Larry Allen joined the Federal Drive with Tom Temin for more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

After a short break for the Martin Luther King Day holiday, Congress is back. Members will resume budget talks that started late last week, which is encouraging given that the continuing resolution deadline is just a month away. WTOP Capitol Hill Correspondent Mitchell Miller has the latest. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Program evaluation dates almost as far back as government programs. But the art and science of program evaluation is always changing. The Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act, passed back in 2018, aims to bring data and data science more deeply into evaluation. There's even a foundation to support this work. Recently it surveyed agencies to see how they're doing. Data Foundation president Nick Hart joined the Federal Drive to discuss the findings. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As national security threats seem to multiply constantly, nuclear non-proliferation remains an abiding priority. Now there's a new guy at the helm of the National Security Sciences Directorate, part of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Associate lab director Dr. Moe Khaleel joined the Federal Drive to discuss his new role. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A small but profound change in Defense Department procurement is underway, namely a move away from the DUNS numbers used for decades as way to reference contractor corporate entities. And the vaccine mandate picks up steam against unvaccinated service members. These stories are part of this week's DOD Reporters Notebook by Federal News Network's Scott Maucione and Jared Serbu. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

President Barack Obama wouldn’t give his up. President George W. Bush wasn’t allowed to have one, even though he wanted to. For about 15 years, the BlackBerry phone was seemingly velcroed to every federal executive hand from the Oval Office on down. But when Research in Motion, which owns BlackBerry, ended its support for the aging but still loved mobile device, it ended an era in the federal government. In his weekly Reporter's Notebook, executive editor Jason Miller collected memories from federal officials about the BlackBerry and its long-lasting impact on the federal market. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Log4j, the most visible cybersecurity threat since Solar Winds, has organizations scrambling to find and fix instances of certain software. My next guest says that the two incidents are totally different technically, buy they produce the same lessons learned. Gordon Bitko is former FBI chief information officer, now the senior vice president of policy at the Information Technology Industry Council. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

No matter what happens on the viral front, the workplace is not going to look like 2019. In early 2020, agencies hastily set up remote working capabilities for people suddenly forced to telework. My next guest says, now agencies need to think about how this is going to work long term. Deniece Peterson is the director of federal market analysis at Deltek, Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices