A revamped version of the government’s information technology tracking website released Tuesday provides granular details about investments and allows users to view funding by bureau and services provided.
The three-year-old website, called the IT Dashboard, uses data from agencies’ budget submissions, investment data and evaluations by the chief information officers to track the health of federal IT projects.
“By publicly posting data on more than 700 IT investments across the Federal government, we armed agencies with the tools needed to reduce duplication in IT spending, strengthen the accountability of agency CIOs, and provide more accurate and detailed information on projects and activities,” federal CIO Steven VanRoekel said in a blog post.
Past reports by the Government Accountability Office highlighted flawed data on the website and inconsistencies in how agencies reported their IT systems. GAO found instances where agencies accounted for some IT systems in their overall IT budget but excluded others. GAO blamed the inconsistencies on murky OMB guidance for how agencies should report IT investments and identify and categorize them.
OMB has since clarified its guidance for how agencies should report IT investments.
The updated website allows users to view individual projects tied to larger IT investment, funding data and performance and download data to build applications. VanRoekel said agencies and the public can use the data to view the services each investment provides and spot areas of duplication.
