According to the Bush administration’s fiscal 2005 budget
request the government needs to strengthen IT management
and leverage the Internet to simplify and enhance service
delivery to get the most out of its barely increased IT
budget of $57.1 billion.
The budget painted a rosy picture of IT management, stating
that agencies have made significant improvements over the
past year: 61 percent of major federal agencies have secure
IT systems compared to 47 percent two years ago, and 62
percent have modernization blueprints in place ensuring
investments support agency goals and are not redundant.
But will be up to managers to achieve these kinds of
successes without additional funding over this year’s
appropriation, such as improvements in service delivery
through e-Gov initiatives. That means getting more out of
everybody and everything – personnel and resources, and
showing it.
The budget cited Grants.gov as an example for making it
easier for potential recipients to obtain information
about federal grants by creating a single site for all
federal grants, and e-Travel, a web-based travel
management system expected to save $300 million over 10
years.
