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September 22, 2004
Welcome to your latest edition of the FirstGov Buzz e-letter!
In this issue:
The E-Gov Spotlight
 Robert
N. McFarland
Assistant Secretary for Information and Technology
U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
Bob McFarland describes himself as a businessman first, and a technologist
second.
“That’s how I think, and 33 years in the information technology industry have
pretty well cast that in concrete,” says McFarland, Assistant Secretary for
Information and Technology at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.
“What I bring to Secretary (Anthony) Principi and VA is what I like to call `a
fresh set of eyes,’” McFarland says. “I bring to the table a business sense that
might be a new way of looking at things. I can advise the Secretary as to what
might be the best business decision.”
McFarland’s official role is to advise the Secretary on all matters pertaining
to IT systems acquisition and management. He oversees VA’s $1.6 billion IT
budget and operation of its computer systems and telecommunication networks for
medical information, veterans’ benefits payments, life insurance programs and
financial management systems.
When McFarland was sworn in last Jan. 30, Secretary Principi said the new
Assistant Secretary would bring “extensive experience in leading large
organizations and a proven record of success.”
Before joining VA, McFarland was vice president of government relations for Dell
Computer Corp. An Army Vietnam veteran, he holds a bachelor’s degree in business
management from LeTourneau University in Longview, Texas.
Asked his top challenge, McFarland cited a department-wide telecommunications
wide area network modernization project begun in 2002. The goal is a state of
the art, VA-wide area network that is simple to administer and maintain. Once
completed, the network will provide a standardized, centrally managed, and
secure data telecommunications network for all VA facilities.
Another priority is to consolidate over 530 exchange servers at 270 exchange
sites to a more manageable number of sites and far fewer servers in order to
ensure seamless communication within VA via the electronic mail system. The
purpose is to decrease costs, improve performance and availability, and provide
more efficient IT utility service to increase the agency’s ability to serve
veterans.
Another serious challenge veterans face in dealing with VA is that many business
lines and locations within the VA community do not share veteran identification
and registration information. “This is a direct result of the limitations in
technology capabilities at the time these legacy systems were developed,”
McFarland says. “We now have an excellent Enterprise Architecture plan for
systems, data and applications, effectively ending the ‘stovepipe’ systems
design and incompatible systems of the past.”
The One VA enterprise architecture is intended to ensure that veterans feel the
VA knows “who they are and we are able to answer their questions about specific
issues,” McFarland says. “We need to effectively provide end-to-end services
without frustrating them, give them access to our systems for their own needs,
and ensure they believe that VA staff and systems are here to serve and honor
them.”
One example is VA’s Registration Eligibility and Contact Management initiative,
which seeks to establish a single authoritative source for all veteran
identification, service history, and demographic, family history and location
data, which will then be shared by all VA business lines.
While VA’s web environment is outdated and not user friendly, a work group has
been tasked to redesign and the agency Web site. In the meantime, there are
outstanding resources on VA’s web pages that can answer most questions from
veterans or dependents. For instance, the agency offers on-line applications for
benefits, including compensation and pensions, education, health eligibility and
vocational rehabilitation and employment services.
Veterans and their dependents can find information on special programs such as
accessibility, homeless veterans, and women veterans. Returning veterans,
active duty, National Guard and Reserve service members of Operations Enduring
Freedom and Iraqi Freedom have a special web page that addresses transition
assistance, health and benefits information.
In the future, VA will also team up with GSA’s USA Services to help provide
quicker and easier access to information and services. McFarland sees VA using
USA Services to forward correspondence, email and telephone communications from
veterans, their dependents or other citizens when it has been incorrectly sent
to VA. USA Services will then respond to the veteran or citizen and forward the
communication to the correct government agency.
FirstGov.gov Fourth Anniversary Celebration and Award Recognition
Senator Larry Craig, Congressman Joe Wilson and more than 200
guests celebrated the fourth anniversary of
FirstGov.gov. and its selection for
the prestigious Innovations in American Government award on September 15th
in the historic Diplomatic Reception Rooms at the Department of State.
GSA Administrator Stephen A. Perry noted that, “FirstGov.gov has come a
long way in four short years, and we can only imagine what new levels of
efficiency and effectiveness are on the horizon to keep citizens plugged
into their government.”
Senator Craig and Congressman Wilson both extolled the value of the site
as a way for their constituencies, and all Americans, to stay in close and
frequent touch with government. Craig pointed out that those living in
rural areas make great use of the site to better connect with government.
Congressman Wilson, whose son is serving in Iraq, said he and the parents
of other servicemen and women overseas are grateful for the connectivity
that FirstGov.gov allows with their loved ones.
The occasion also provided a sneak preview of an online toolkit that will
guide federal Web managers as they design U.S. government Web sites to be
the most citizen-focused and visitor-friendly in the world.
The Interagency Committee on Government Information (ICGI), through a team
of Web managers representing all Cabinet agencies, developed the toolkit
to provide easy access to best practices and other practical tools that
will enable agencies to replicate the most successful and innovative Web
sites in government.
Attendees got a first glimpse of GSA’s latest television public service
advertisement for FirstGov.gov, which demonstrates in a FirstGov.gov’s
light-hearted way the lengths the government will go to in order to serve
the public.
Also on the agenda was the premiere of a 9-minute segment featuring
FirstGov.gov slated to appear in “The Visionaries,” a nationally broadcast
public television series hosted by acclaimed actor Sam Waterston. The
episode featuring FirstGov.gov will be broadcast to PBS stations during
the 2004-05 television season.
USA Services Will Better Serve Agencies and Citizens With a
New Contact Center Contract
Federal agencies needing single or multi-dimensional contact center
solutions services will now find it much easier to satisfy their
requirements under a unique contract now available through USA Services.
GSA recently awarded the contract to five vendors, who are able to provide a
wide range of contact center solutions to help agencies serve citizens more
efficiently and effectively. The five vendors are: The ICT Group of
Newtown, PA; Pearson Government Solutions of Arlington, VA.; Teletech
Government Solutions of Englewood, CO.; Aspen Systems Corporation of
Rockville, MD.; and Datatrac Information Services, Inc., of Richardson, TX.
For more information on how your agency can
make use of this contract, please contact Stuart Willoughby at 202-501-9121
or stuart.willoughby@gsa.gov.
Brown University Again Rates FirstGov.gov as
the Number One Federal Website
By a huge margin, FirstGov.gov has
been rated as the number one Federal Web site in the fifth annual
e-government analysis conducted by researchers at Brown University’s Taubman
Center for Public Policy. The portal received a score of 88 out of 100, up
four points from last year, when the site was also ranked first. Social
Security was ranked second, with a score of 65. The top ranked states are
Tennessee (score of 57) and Maine (score of 55).
According to the study,“…Firstgov, has an abundance of online transactions.
It incorporates all sorts of different services in an easy to access
manner.“ The document goes on to note that, “Even with all this information
included on the page, the federal government’s portal is clear and simple,
and easy to use.
Evaluators evaluated 1,629 federal and state Web sites for the presence of
various electronic features. Among these were: online databases, foreign
language or language translation, multiple indicators of security policy,
digital signatures, email addresses, comment forms, automatic email updates,
Web site personalization, PDA accessibility, quality control, and
readability level.
For full information on this e-government study, visit: http://www.insidepolitics.org/PressRelease04us.html.
FirstGov’s
Seniors.gov Praised in Philadelphia Inquirer
Calling it a site for those in the over-50 crowd who hate to waste time, and
noting that, “…the site is well organized and easy to navigate [and] has
links to daily updated information relevant to seniors,” Robert O’Neill of
the The Philadelphia Inquirer recently praised
www.seniors.gov. He also told readers
that some of the links are interactive and that it was possible to apply for
benefits online.
FirstGov.gov’s
Subscription Page Reaches 1 Million Subscribers
FirstGov.gov’s subscription page has made 1 million subscription
referrals to 45 free federal email newsletters since it was launched on Dec.
4, 2001. This voluntary effort had no staff and no funding. The
subscription page won an E-Gov Trailblazer award in 2002. To see the
subscription page, go to www.firstgov.gov and scroll down the right side
under “News and Features” to “Free E-Mail Newsletters.”
New
Content Management System for FirstGov.gov
With the implementation of a new content management system, FirstGov.gov, will
provide citizens with more timely and more reliable government information.
Most Web sites use automated content management systems to manage large blocks
of text or graphics on a Web page, but the new Vignette version 7 system
implemented at FirstGov.gov goes one step farther by giving its content managers
the ability to enter and maintain content and links to other sites once while
using them in multiple places across the site. This allows much more
flexibility in managing the content, but more importantly, ensures citizens have
access to the most up-to-date government information and can find it in a manner
that makes sense to them.
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