IT DASHBOARD: http://it.usaspending.gov/
Has anybody taken a good glance at this and noticed the difference a word can make? “Investment”
I pulled up the “IT Dashboard” to try to figure out what it was telling me about US government and the new administration has decided to show us how much they are spending and where the money is going. But rather than call it spending as the site domain says, they have listed it as investments.
If GIS were more often considered an investment it would certainly help!
Each “investment” is rated by the agencies CIO and is reported as a stoplight Red, Yellow, Green which provides a quick scorecard to the public.
As a citizen – I don’t want to see any of my investments in red. (note the change in my language to “my investments”)
DOA (Agriculture) has an investment Geographic Information Services (GIS) #84 (Yellow, 4.7). An immediate red flag on the investment is because it is late and not rated by the CIO. Further investigation and several indicators (all 28) were not rated. This has the potential to make the Prime Contractor look bad (our sponsors).
If I don’t like this rating I can contact the Agency CIO by email, phone or snail mail.
Looking at this further and I think this is in part NAIP contracts, and I’m sure we have a bunch of angry citizens if the NAIP imagery program is getting poor ratings. According to the site this investment “needs attention”.
What does NSGIC have to say about this GIS “investment”?
Big kudos to the Obama administration to get me thinking about my government and its spending as an investment.
Update:
ReplyDeleteI wrote a comment on the "investment" and told them I appreciate the information and would like for this investment to be rated in all 28 indicators.
The site thanked me for my comment and stated that it was important that I am involved as a citizen.
This is a good use of tax dollars in my opinion, it is a good investment.
I am waiting for the response.