Bipartisan bill to boost oversight of agency digital services clears Senate panel
A bipartisan House bill aimed at improving customer service interactions with government technology breezed through a key Senate panel Wednesday, putting it one step closer to becoming law.
The Government Service Delivery Improvement Act passed the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee by an 11-0 tally, setting it up for a vote before the full chamber. The bill, first introduced by Reps. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., Byron Donalds, R-Fla., Barry Loudermilk, R-Ga., and William Timmons, R-S.C. in the House last October, passed that chamber in May.
The legislation tasks agency heads with designating a senior official to oversee service delivery improvements and charges the Office of Management and Budget with choosing a senior official to coordinate governmentwide efforts on the issue.
Khanna said in an email to FedScoop that the bill “will make it easier and more efficient than ever for Americans to access government services including Social Security, retirement benefits, Medicare health coverage, veterans’ benefits, and student loans.” He added that he was “grateful” to HSGAC Chair Gary Peters, D-Mich., and ranking member Rand Paul, R-Ky., for shepherding the bill through the committee, and “hopeful it will pass the Senate and head to the president’s desk.”
Following the House’s passage of the bill in May, Loudermilk said the requirements of agency staffers laid out in the text would ensure “a more effective, reliable, and responsive federal government” that “works to keep its promise to deliver quality services to the American people.”
In the same press release, Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., ranking member of the House Oversight and Accountability Cybersecurity, Information Technology, and Government Innovation Subcommittee, stressed the importance of the federal government’s ability to “measure its progress” in how public-facing agency products are modernized.
“It’s absolutely imperative that the public interacts with a modern, accessible, and customer-focused government,” Connolly said.
The legislation builds on Khanna’s the 21st Century IDEA Act, which called for a “consistent look” in government websites that complied with Technology Transformation Service standards. The bill, which was signed into law by then-President Donald Trump at the end of 2018, also featured a variety of measures to modernize and improve the accessibility of agency websites. OMB and the Office of the Federal CIO last year released guidance aimed at holding agencies accountable to provisions in the law.
Two other government tech-related bills passed the Senate panel Wednesday: the GSA Technology Accountability Act from Connolly and Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, and the Telework Transparency Act from Peters and Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa.
The Connolly-Sessions bill would “ensure GSA is held accountable to Congress and the American people in how it spends taxpayer dollars on technology projects and initiatives,” per a press release from Sessions’ staff in March that accompanied the bill’s introduction.
The Senate telework bill, which was introduced in April, would require federal agencies to collect data on remote work and track its impact on performance and property decisions.
“My bipartisan bill will require agencies to gather accurate data on telework policies to provide more transparency and help ensure federal agencies are effectively carrying out their missions for the American people,” Peters said at the time.
