Federal Drive

Wednesday Morning Federal Newsstand

Written by Ruben Gomez Edited by Suzanne Kubota This morning’s federal news as heard on WFED: FEMA may need to wait a bit longer for its new leader. Lousi...

Federal News Network Staff

May 6, 2009 8:15 am

2 min read

Written by Ruben Gomez
Edited by Suzanne Kubota

This morning’s federal news as heard on WFED:

FEMA may need to wait a bit longer for its new leader. Lousiana Senator David Vitter is blocking Craig Fugate’s nomination to head the agency. Vitter cites lingering concerns from Hurricane Katrina. He says FEMA still hasn’t answered questions about the reconstruction process in Louisiana, but he doesn’t say how long the hold on Fugate will last.

The White House releases its detailed 2010 federal budget request tomorrow. The document will build on the blueprint unveiled in February. It will contain specific funding requests for Congress to vote on. The White House also planning to release details on programs they plan to cut or scale back.

Another letter for the social networking alphabet in the intelligence community. The Defense Intelligence Agency is working on J-Space to improve information-sharing. It’ll be open to anyone working for the nation’s 16 intelligence agencies. The community already has A Space and C Space. Those tools are for analysts and collectors.

Stimulus projects threaten to fry the acquisition workforce at the General Services Administration. GSA inspector general Brian Miller tells lawmakers that the Recovery Act is placing increased pressure on the agency’s Public Building Service. Government Executive reports that PBS is expecting an influx of work as other agencies use its pre-negotiated contracts for stimulus projects. PBS received $5.5 billion dollars for building construction and improvement. And it has just 18 months to spend most of that money.

Concerns over peanut safety alone have generated 40 million hits to the FDA’s web site. Health and Human Services says all of that traffic came from a widget with information on peanut recalls. Anyone can place the widget on their web site. HHS is using similar tools with information on swine flu and stimulus spending.