GPO’s fiscal 2012 appropriations cut drastically #FDLP
Amidst the turmoil of GPO Public Printer Bill Boarman being forced to step down after not receiving a vote on his confirmation, there's this news that GPO's 2012 appropriations have been drastically cut.
While Boarman's approval did not go through Congress, GPO's fiscal 2012 funding did, in a spending bill approved by the House and Senate, known as an omnibus because it consolidates a majority of individual spending bills. The bill secured Senate passage Dec. 17 in a 67-32 vote a day after the House approved it 296-121. President Obama is expected to sign the bill into law. The bill funds GPO at $90.7 million in fiscal 2012. The budget authority is almost $45 million less than GPO's fiscal 2011 funding level of $135 million, and close to $48 million less than the White House's fiscal 2012 budget request of $148.5 million. GPO will also get $500,000 to its revolving fund for information technology development, according to a report (.pdf) accompanying the bill. House Appropriations Committee's majority spokesperson Jennifer Hing said language in an earlier House version of the bill requiring the Government Accountability Office to conduct a feasibility study on GPO operations stands. In July, the House legislative branch appropriations bill, H.R. 2551 (.pdf), highlighted the need to modernize GPO programs. In the report (.pdf) accompanying the bill, lawmakers said they had "some concern about the future of the GPO as a viable printing operation for the federal government." It also suggested GPO might be privatized, since it already contracts out more than 90 percent of its printing requisitions. Committee members said a GAO report should examine whether the General Services Administration could take over printing duties for the executive branch and the remainder of the GPO could be privatized. Such a plan would involve transfer of the Superintendent of Documents program to the Library of Congress.Continue reading
Only Half of Dot-Gov Sites are Active, GSA Reports
From a NextGov Article:
Nearly one-fifth of federal Web domains are inactive and one-fourth redirect to other dot-gov sites, according to an inventory conducted between August and October. Active government domains employ 150 different content management systems, a hodgepodge of design templates that vary wildly from one division to the next, and a host of different performance metrics, according to a report compiled by the General Services Administration and the Office of Management and Budget. [Clip] The report lists 1,489 total government Web domains and about 11,000 websites. [Clip] At most of the inactive sites in the report, agencies appear to own the Web domain name but are no longer maintaining it. Some sites mayhave been shut down as part of the reform initiative, though.Read the Complete Article Direct to State of the Federal Web Report (61 pages; PDF) Continue reading
Government Printing Office Boss Out After Senate Fails to Vote
Via INFOdocket.com From The Washington Post:
The head of the Government Printing Office is out of a job — and he says he doesn’t know why. Nobody on Capitol Hill or at the White House has told William Boarman why senators didn’t vote to confirm him before they left town over the weekend. President Obama granted Boarman a recess appointment earlier this year, after an April 2010 nomination to lead the agency responsible for printing government documents, training manuals, passports and maps. By law, recess appointees not confirmed by the end of the next Senate term must step down. In November, two GOP senators dropped a hold on Boarman’s nomination and seemingly assured his eventual confirmation. But Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) said late Saturday that fresh concerns with the nomination meant it wouldn’t happen.Read the Complete Washington Post Article See Also: News Release from the GPO
Bill Boarman has been honored to serve as the 26th Public Printer of the U.S. Government Printing Office (GPO) for the last year. Having been nominated originally 20 months ago, having been reported out of the Senate Rules and Administration Committee unanimously twice, and not having been permitted to learn and respond to the nature of the objection to his confirmation, Boarman is disappointed in the result of Saturday’s Senate action. Nevertheless, he is proud of GPO's accomplishments this past year as the digital information platform for the Federal Government.See Also: Comments by Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) Published in Congressional Record (December 17, 2011) Continue reading
State Agency Databases Activity Report 12/18/2011
Welcome to the last State Agency Databases Activity Report for 2011. As this report is written on Sundays, I'll be taking a break for Christmas and New Year's. If you celebrate Christmas I wish you a Merry Christmas, otherwise I wish you a great holiday season and hope you have a happy and informative 2012. With our December link checking in full swing, this past week was quite busy at the State Agency Databases Across the Fifty States project at http://wikis.ala.org/godort/index.php/State_Agency_Databases. SUBJECT PAGE ACTIVITY Health Practitioner Databases (Lynn McClelland) With the addition of Maryland and New Mexico, Lynn McClelland reports that she has posted information on various kinds of health practitioners for all 50 states plus the District of Columbia. We hope that you will explore and share this page far and wide. If the Health Practitioner Databases page inspires you to create a subject page of your own, please let me know. OTHER WIKI ACTIVITY See our last seven days of activity at http://tinyurl.com/statedbs for a blow by blow description of changes to the wiki. Here are a few highlights: DATABASES ADDED CALIFORNIA (Joel Rane) Online Documents Search Form - Decisions, resolutions, and rulings signed by the [Public Utilities] Commission are available online starting in July 2000, searchable by title, the type of document, date, proceeding number or the type of utility. DELAWARE (John A. Stevenson) DOE School Locator - Search for schools associated with an address or housing development. GEORGIA (Chris Sharpe) [Supreme Court] Computerized Docketing System and Case Types - Search by case number,attorney's name, or style. NEW MEXICO (Adrienne Walker) Child Care Search - This database provides a customized, detailed search based around your needs. Searches can be performed by important criteria such as location, age of child, days/hours of care, and others is maintained by Mexico Kids and lists child care providers that are licensed or registered by recognized regulatory agencies in the state of New Mexico. The online search requires registration to log in. OTHER NEWS After January 1, 2012, I will be examining pages to see the last time a volunteer touched them. Any pages that haven't been edited since January 1, 2011 will be reassigned. Continue reading
House To Be More Open
The House of Representatives has adopted new "Standards for the Electronic Posting of House and Committee Documents & Data." The rules affect bills, resolutions, amendments, and conference reports of the House and for committees: rules, bills, resolutions, committee prints, meeting notices, witness lists and testimony, public notices, amendments, and committee record of votes. In addition, video of committee hearings and markups will be stored by the House to meet requirements for archiving, access, searchability, and authenticity.
- House To Be More Open: OKs Online Publication Standard, by Daniel Schuman, Sunlight Foundation, (Dec. 16, 2011). Taking effect on January 1, 2012, the resolution instructs the Clerk of the House to maintain a single website where the public can access all House bills, amendments, and resolutions for floor consideration in XML. In addition, committees will be encouraged to post their documents on that site in XML whenever possible -- and searchable PDFs when not -- with the expectation that mandatory publication requirements in XML will soon be imposed.
- Standards for the Electronic Posting of House and Committee Documents & Data, "Committee Resolution," Committee On House Administration.