Gerry Connolly (D-VA) and Darrell Issa (R-CA) have launched the bipartisan Congressional IT Modernization Caucus, their goal being to help bring awareness to governments’ need to embrace technology and analytics to better deliver services to the American public.
“The recent COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the consequence of this inaction from the Small Business Administrations’ loan processing system crashing multiple times to the state of Connecticut website not handling more than 8,300 unemployment applications,” said Connolly. “It has become abundantly clear that to generate the necessary resilience against future crises effectively, governments at all levels must fully embrace cutting-edge technology and data analytics.”
“Our nation should not be satisfied only with a leading position in global IT modernization. America must instead commit to the pinnacle of invention, innovation, and discovery,” said Issa. “This is the best way to meet and exceed competition from China and safeguard our technological independence. This bipartisan caucus has a key role to play.”
The Congressional IT Modernization Caucus will bring together federal policymakers and private enterprises to break through barriers and modernize federal IT to meet the needs of the 21st century. The caucus will serve as an informal group of members of Congress dedicated to addressing IT modernization challenges across government as well as educating other members on subjects of interest regarding federal IT.
Issa and Connolly are the co-authors of the Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act (FITARA), the first major federal IT modernization effort in more than 20 years. Since becoming law, FITARA has driven positive change in acquiring and managing information technology systems across 24 federal agencies, saving taxpayers more than $20 billion and improving the security of federal IT systems.
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