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Tax Reform Expert Nancy Sieger Named IRS’ Full-Time CIO; Chuck Rettig Quoted
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Tax Reform Expert Nancy Sieger Named IRS’ Full-Time CIO; Chuck Rettig Quoted

Nancy Sieger, who has been the Internal Revenue Service's (IRS) acting chief information officer for almost two years, will take up the role on a full-time basis. Sieger oversees all aspects of IRS' information technology systems, which are essential to the U.S. tax infrastructure, the agency said Tuesday.

She served as the agency's associate CIO for applications development and held other roles related to tax reform and operations in the agency. The tax reform expert also helped IRS implement technology transitions demanded by the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.

"Nancy has done an exemplary job as acting CIO supporting delivery of two rounds of economic interest payments totaling more than $420 billion along with individual tax refunds of more than $320 billion during the pandemic," said Chuck Rettig, commissioner of IRS.

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New Joint Systems Integration Lab Hosts First Comms Exercise for Army’s Project Convergence 2021; Kim Moeltner Quoted
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New Joint Systems Integration Lab Hosts First Comms Exercise for Army’s Project Convergence 2021; Kim Moeltner Quoted

The U.S. Army’s Joint Modernization Command and the DEVCOM C5ISR Center conducted the first of four planned communications exercises at the newly established Joint Systems Integration Lab at Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland in January as part of the service’s Project Convergence 2021 initiative, the service reported.

Project Convergence seeks to achieve a multidomain, networked force by 2035 through a series of developmental exercises and efforts. The new facility – JSIL – provided JMC and the DEVCOM C5ISR Center a venue to perform lab-based risk reduction and evaluate system connectivity.

“The DEVCOM C5ISR Center stood up the JSIL as a result of lessons learned during Project Convergence 20,” said Kim Moeltner, systems engineering and integration branch chief. “It allows us to replicate a realistic tactical network environment so we can understand how varying conditions will affect systems’ resilience and reliability.” 

Moeltner said the lab helps the Army achieve cost savings by allowing engineers to assess, validate and integrate emerging application, network and radio technologies in a controlled environment before they are deployed into the field.

System engineers and leaders from Program Executive Office Command, Control, Communications-Tactical, PEO Soldier, Army Test and Evaluation Command, Network Cross-Functional Team and operational units participated in the event.

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Steve Butow: U.S. Military Eyes New Space Architecture to Facilitate Emerging Tech Integration
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Steve Butow: U.S. Military Eyes New Space Architecture to Facilitate Emerging Tech Integration

Steve Butow, director of the space portfolio at the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU), said the U.S. military is now looking to migrate to a new space architecture that could allow the government to incorporate emerging technologies and use commoditized satellite buses and related components to build modular systems, SpaceNews reported Wednesday.

“The 20th century model doesn’t exist anymore,” said Butow said Wednesday at the SmallSat Symposium. “We need a logistics infrastructure that that’s not exclusive to the military to civil space or commercial space but a logistics architecture.”

Such an architecture would enable the government to purchase new satellites and use space tug services from the commercial sector to upgrade the spacecraft with new sensors and processors.

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Rep. Jim Langevin Lays Out Priorities as Chairman of New House Cyber Subcommittee
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Rep. Jim Langevin Lays Out Priorities as Chairman of New House Cyber Subcommittee

Rep. Jim Langevin, D-R.I., will serve as chairman of the newly established panel within the House Armed Services Committee (HASC) that will focus on cybersecurity and efforts to advance innovation within the Department of Defense (DOD), Federal News Network reported Wednesday. 

Langevin said the new cyber, innovative technologies and information systems subcommittee’s agenda in the next legislation session will focus on cyber force structure, artificial intelligence, supply chain safety, combatant commands and cyber infrastructure.

“The era of technology has been growing at a rapid pace and becoming more and more important in the Pentagon, in Pentagon budgets and planning,” Langevin told FNN in an interview. “Cyber and AI information operations have become more and more important. We want to make sure that the right resources and attention is being given to oversight in all these areas.” 

Langevin said he wants the subcommittee to look into the cyber forces within DOD, the roles of Cyber Command, Space Command and geographic commands, the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) cloud contract and the Cyber Diplomacy bill, among other priorities.

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NNSA-FBI Team Hosts Virtual Workshop on Radiological Threats; Jay Tilden Quoted
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NNSA-FBI Team Hosts Virtual Workshop on Radiological Threats; Jay Tilden Quoted

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and the FBI held a virtual training activity to raise awareness on nuclear and radiological threats to local and state public safety personnel.

The two-and-a-half hour Radiological Fundamentals, Preparedness, and Training event sought to guide the attendees in responding to various nuclear threats such as irradiated and contaminated environments, the Department of Energy said Tuesday.

The workshop covered the basic characteristics of radiation, danger levels as well as approaches on protecting the community from associated security risks.

"While many major metropolitan areas receive significant resources to contend with WMD threats, reaching mid-sized communities, including state and local entities that typically do not receive this type of training, deepens the Nation’s capabilities," said Jay Tilden, associate administrator and deputy undersecretary at NNSA's Office of Counterterrorism and Counterproliferation (CTCP).

CTCP seeks to host monthly workshops managed by the partnership across the year.

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Bureau of Fiscal Service, VA CDOs Talk Efforts to Automate Appropriations, Data Mgmt
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Bureau of Fiscal Service, VA CDOs Talk Efforts to Automate Appropriations, Data Mgmt

Justin Marsico, chief data officer of the Bureau of the Fiscal Service, said the bureau’s pilot effort to use artificial intelligence to process documents helps reduce friction for remote employees, Federal News Network reported Tuesday.

Last year, the Department of the Treasury component launched a pilot program to deploy AI to ingest unstructured data from sources such as PDFs to simplify the appropriations process.

BFS deployed algorithms that use natural language processing to handle data from the appropriations bill and identify potential discrepancies and issues, Marsico told attendees at a virtual event hosted by the Advanced Technology Academic Research Center.

Kshemendra Paul, CDO of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), noted at a FedInsider webinar that the VA is finalizing its data strategy along with efforts to establish a ”joint vision” with the Department of Defense on data analytics.

The concept is meant to “recognize and build on the customer experience journey-mapping that VA has led on,” he noted.

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GSA Eyes Two-Phase SAM Portal Rollout in April, May
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GSA Eyes Two-Phase SAM Portal Rollout in April, May

The General Services Administration (GSA) will roll out its two-phase effort to combine the legacy System for Award Management (SAM) portal with the beta SAM.gov website this spring.

Phase One of the modernization effort will begin on April 26 in preparation for the full migration and consolidation of both integrated award environments (IAE), GSA said Monday. Phase Two will take place on May 24 and result in the transition of the new SAM.gov from its beta phase.

The updated IAE portal will include features for identifying contract opportunities and visualizing wage determinations under a single log-in.

Launched in 2017, the beta SAM website was initially envisioned to consolidate 10 IAE systems. Three systems have transitioned operations to the beta portal to date, according to GSA. GSA plans to hold a walkthrough of the new portal in May.

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DLA, GSA Address Issues in Export Transshipment; Perry Knight Quoted
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DLA, GSA Address Issues in Export Transshipment; Perry Knight Quoted

The Defense Logistics Agency’s (DLA) distribution arm concluded a year-long initiative to streamline supply chain operations and address the General Services Administration’s (GSA) challenges in transporting items that were halted at the shipping chain level.

DLA Distribution and GSA worked to realign supply chain processes to simplify financial operations and properly identify and bill the latter’s frustrated freight and export transshipments, DLA said Tuesday.

The effort resulted in the closing of $5 million in transshipment charges to the GSA as well as the identification of 84,000 items impacted by frustrated freight.

Perry Knight, deputy commander of DLA Distribution, said the joint initiative helped improve processes as well as the delivery of support to warfighters. GSA and DLA also worked with the U.S. African Command and European Command to align supply chain operations.

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DISA-STRATCOM Field Office Shuts Down Legacy Information Facility for New System
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DISA-STRATCOM Field Office Shuts Down Legacy Information Facility for New System

The Defense Information Systems Agency's (DISA) field office with U.S. Strategic Command has closed down the core of a legacy military network to give way to a new command and control facility.

The Defense Information Systems Network's final core device shut down on Dec. 21 to be succeeded by a new C2 system with modern telecommunications technology, DISA said Tuesday.

The now defunct legacy facility, which was operated by Offutt Air Force Base, supported the U.S. military's telecommunications for nearly four decades.

“DISA-STRATCOM Field Office leadership and on-site coordination were the key enablers that facilitated delivery of capability ahead of schedule and within budget," said David Bennett, director of operations at DISA.

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Christopher Barnhurst Named DISA Executive Deputy Director
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Christopher Barnhurst Named DISA Executive Deputy Director

Christopher Barnhurst, formerly chief financial officer at the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA), has succeeded Anthony Montemarano as executive deputy director at the agency. Barnhurst will help DISA address potential issues and drive the implementation of perimeter, boundary and endpoint cybersecurity capabilities under his new role, the agency said Tuesday.

He will also assist the agency in performing a mission analysis and optimizing its capabilities as an enterprise information technology and combat support provider. Barnhurst previously held the roles of deputy chief financial officer and principal adviser to the comptroller for planning, programming, budgeting and execution at DISA.

“The CFO position further prepared me for the role of executive deputy director in the sense that it is one of the few positions in the agency that has total visibility across all centers and programs,” said Barnhurst.

As DISA’s chief financial officer and comptroller, during which time he provided oversight for executing an $11 budget. The senior executive service member also supervised the creation of a revised pricing scheme for DISA’s network services.

“We will also need to be hyper-focused on data management – both how we use the data we generate to inform strategic and operational decisions, and how we contribute to the execution of the department’s over-arching data strategy outlined by DoD CIO,” Barnhurst added.

Montemarano departed from his role at DISA in December.

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