Skip to main content

New Federal CIO




From last November:

Vivek Kundra Rumored Working on Obama Transition
Nov 20, 2008, By Matt Williams, Assistant Editor

Buzz is growing among insiders that Vivek Kundra, the chief technology officer of Washington, D.C., is advising President-elect Barack Obama's transition team.

Kundra's portfolio of work appears to complement a goal in Obama's technology agenda to "use cutting-edge technologies to create a new level of transparency, accountability and participation for America's citizens." Of course, Kundra's close proximity to the U.S. Capitol doesn't hurt.

Kundra declined comment Wednesday about his rumored involvement with the Obama administration.

Washington, D.C., Mayor Adrian Fenty appointed Kundra the District of Columbia's CTO in March 2007, and Kundra has quickly made a name for himself as an innovator who is unafraid of new ideas.

Last week, Kundra and Fenty announced winners of the district's Apps for Democracy contest, which challenged participants to design open source applications that integrate data from the D.C. Data Catalog, information that's released in real time by several government agencies. Fenty said last week the contest would save Washington, D.C., millions of dollars in software development costs.

"The greater part here is the democratization of public data, and the engagement of citizens, and the engagement of the private sector to help us drive innovation and leverage the power of technology," Kundra said at last week's Apps for Democracy press conference.

Kundra has also gained recognition for his use of hosted applications like Google Mail and his unique IT portfolio management model that tracks projects like investments in the stock market.

"We use that [stock] data to decide whether to hold on to the project, invest more or kill it -- similar to what portfolios in a private market would do as far as sell, buy or hold," Kundra told Government Technology in July. "That's brought a lot of scrutiny and moved us aggressively in terms of killing projects that won't deliver."

Kundra's focus on efficient spending could be attractive to the Obama administration as it attempts to eliminate waste from the federal budget amid a ballooning $10 trillion national deficit and what many economists expect will be a protracted recession.

It's unknown if Kundra is on the list of candidates for the new position of national chief technology officer, which is prescribed in Obama's technology agenda. Several high-profile names have been floated for the job, including two from Google: Vint Cerf, the company's chief Internet evangelist, and CEO Eric Schmidt.

source: http://www.govtech.com/gt/articles/562918

Inspired by 9/11?:


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

BREAKING NEWS: USC to Absorb HUC in LA?

This just in from "The God Blog." A source told Jewish Journal editor-in-chief Rob Eshman that the University of Southern California and Hebrew Union College-Jewish institute of Religion, which already share some faculty and facilities, are working on a deal to fold the L.A. campus into USC as a Jewish studies program. “Its a win win,“ the source said. “HUC gets a big chunk of money for what it owns—about a block of prime real estate by the USC campus—and USC gets to solidify a Jewish studies and outreach program that it has been building for some time now.“ Hebrew Union College in Los Angeles has been having big problems -- a consolidation of resources may present a novel and impactful solution. VERY INTERESTING.

Why Go to A Conference Anyways?

@lidja @lyndakelly61 @futureofmuseums @creativemerc @museum_flavor pLz look http://tinyurl.com/qxlja4 &here http://bit.ly/q1mhV assoc./conf. grpthink @RichardMcCoy @DanielCull very import.

A Year-end Letter Update from James and Family

Dear Friends and Family, On the brink of the new year on December 31, 2019 we stood at the foot of Kehinde Wiley's brand new monumental equestrian sculpture in downtown Richmond at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. There were a bunch of families gathered around taking pictures together. Emblematic of this entire year and entitled “ Rumors of War ,” the monument depicts an unarmed Black man in heroic pose atop a horse. The man’s sneakers are in the stirrups, looking back over their shoulder like Napoleon as they ride forward up a ridge . It was a strange harbinger of the year that was, and how it’s going. Kamala Harris will be named our vice president in a few weeks. In between, the apocalyptic has been commonplace; I mean, what a year. Emil started high school this fall. Graduation this past spring from Mark Day School was likely the year’s highlight. Karen is still at Mark Day. This fall they've been doing hybrid learning. It’s the first time Karen and Emil have not been goi