The CRS report on the Obama CTO: The challenges
The good folks over at the Federation of American Scientists got their hands on a Jan. 21, 2009 report from the Congressional Research Service headlined, The Federal Chief Technology Officer in the Obama Administration: Options and Issues for Consideration. [Federal News Radio's Jason Miller pointed me to the CRS report. His story is posted here. I have posted the CRS report itself below... you can find the PDF here.]
The long and short of it is… there are issues.
Neither the campaign nor transition documents provide details such as where a CTO would be located organizationally; whether a CTO would be a single position or supported by a staff, office, or agency; and how the duties and authorities of a CTO would be aligned and integrated with existing offices and agencies charged with similar responsibilities, such as the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, Federal Communications Commission, and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration.
Read the full report below.
While we’re on the subject, it still remains completely baffling to me why Congress doesn’t make Congressional Research Service reports public. Instead, organizations such as the Federation of American Scientists have to go about trying to get them and make them public.
Hat tip: Federal News Radio’s Jason Miller
