Federal Drive with Tom Temin

The Office of Personnel Management is planning to give agencies more discretion to handle under-performing federal employees. OPM is looking to repeal a Trump administration policy that prevented agencies from agreeing to remove or change information on a federal employee’s performance record, as a condition for leaving the agency. For a closer look at this policy change, Federal News Network’s Jory Heckman joined the Federal Drive with more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When a ransomware attack shut down Colonial Pipeline last May, it became an important test case for a new way of thinking about risk at the Department of Homeland Security. The new thinking is based on so called National Critical Functions. It aims to make sense of the interdependencies among sectors, like pipelines and transportation. For more, Federal News Network’s Justin Doubleday spoke with Bob Kolasky, director of the National Risk Management Center, on Federal Drive with Tom Temin. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When it comes to protesting defects in solicitations, timing is everything. U.S. Customs and Border Protection changed a solicitation after receiving bids. And it gave bidders very little time to make revisions. That sparked a protest that ended up in the U.S. Court of Appeals. Smith Pachter McWhorter procurement attorney Joe Petrillo had the details on Federal Drive with Tom Temin. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Once touted as almost a miracle communications technology, 5G has run into trouble. The Federal Aviation Administration worries strong signals near airports will interfere with certain aircraft systems essential to safe landings. Verizon and AT&T say it's not so. Just before yesterday's agreement was reached, the Federal Drive with Tom Temin spoke to the President and CEO of the Flight Safety Foundation, Hassan Shahidi, for insight into what's actually going on. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Defense Health Agency has spent the past few years clustering military treatment facilities under its purview into marketplaces. Markets share resources and try to standardize care. Now, DHA is creating a catch-all conglomeration of clinics and hospitals to encompass remote facilities. Federal News Network’s Scott Maucione spoke with the director of the new Small Market and Stand Alone Military Treatment Facility Organization, Maj. Gen. Shanna Woyack, on the Federal Drive with Tom Temin. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For a federal contractor, the best motivation for a new year's resolution is a better shot at more work. My next guest won't help you lose weight or write more letters, but he does have a few things that can help your business prospects. Federal sales and marketing consultant Larry Allen joined the Federal Drive to discuss. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In some ways, the IRS is defined by its some forms. Many of the 800 forms represent a process or transaction. People in the agency's Enterprise Digitalization Project have been exploring quite a few projects that go far beyond simply digitizing forms, to modernizing business processes and case management. For an update, the Federal Drive spoke with project director Harrison Smith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Since 2019, Congress and the Defense Department have heard about mice, mold, lead paint and other issues in privatized military housing. Yet military families are still battling for tenant rights and better housing conditions. Congress created a tenant bill of rights, but some advocates say the implementation has fallen flat. Federal News Network’s Scott Maucione discussed ongoing issues in military homes with the Armed Forces Housing Advocates co-founder Sarah Kline. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Defense Department is slowly chipping away at 117 separate tasks to implement its Electromagnetic Spectrum Superiority Strategy, established in October of 2020. The goal of the strategy and its corresponding implementation plan is to help DoD take advantage of 5G and other spectrum frequencies to address an environment that DoD says is increasingly congested, contested and constrained. Vernita Harris is the director of the electromagnetic spectrum enterprise policy and program office, in the DoD’s office of the chief information officer. She tells executive editor Jason Miller about how this new spectrum strategy builds on and advances the 2013 and 2017 strategies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

After having spent several years tinkering with the Defense Department’s acquisition rules, Congress is turning its attention to one of the other main factors that bogs down the DoD procurement system: The byzantine apparatus the Pentagon and lawmakers use to actually fund each military program. In the crosshairs is what’s known as the Planning, Programming, Budgeting and Execution (PPBE) process, an early Cold War-era construct that, translated to the modern era, means Defense officials usually wait at least two years after they realize they need a new technology before money arrives to start solving the problem. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

From its embassy buildings to how it conducts diplomacy, the State Department has been on a modernization drive. That also includes its information technology. The Bureau of Consular Affairs has been working to consolidate 90 systems into one common system. The effort is known as Consular-One. It's not going all that great. For the latest, Federal Drive host Tom Temin spoke with two people from the State Department office of inspector general, who looked into Consular-One: Vandana Patel, a senior information management inspector and Lisa Piascik, consular inspector. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Congress is contemplating a bill that would require companies to report successful cyber attacks to the federal government. It would enshrine in law many of the requirements in a Biden administration executive order that applies to federal agencies. For analysis, Federal Drive host Tom Temin spoke with Faegre Drinker law firm attorneys Jane Blaney and Jason Weiss. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nearly 80% of the trillion dollar infrastructure bill is slated for grants. Only a sliver is destined for federal contracts. That's all according to a detailed analysis by Bloomberg Government. For details, Federal Drive host Tom Temin spoke with BGov senior data analyst Paul Murphy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Strange workforce issues were important topics in the news this past year. The ongoing hybrid situation continued, lots of people at home, but not those whose work is location specific. It all got leavened by the arrival of vaccines and vaccine mandates. For what you cared about and what it means for the year ahead, Federal News Network's top digital editor, David Thornton. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Who owns your face? Or your fingerprints? And how should they be treated if you use them to gain access to an online system? These very real questions on privacy. And rights to biometric data are amplified by the growing use of artificial intelligence. In fact, the Office of Science and Technology Policy is asking the public to weigh-in on the development of biometric principals. For what's at stake, Federal Drive host Tom Temin talked with attorney Duane Pozza, a partner at Wiley Rein and a specialist in AI and related technologies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices