PITAC Allowed to Expire

["David Farber" <dave () farber net>]

_______________ Forward Header _______________
Subject:        PITAC Allowed to Expire
Author: Peter Harsha <harsha () cra org>
Date:           7th June 2005 11:26:11 am

For IP?

 From the blog, which has oodles of embedded links: http:// 
www.cra.org/govaffairs/blog/archives/000351.html

PITAC ALLOWED TO EXPIRE

After two productive years in which they produced three important  
reports on various aspects of the federal IT R&D portfolio, the  
President's Information Technology Advisory Committee (PITAC) ceased  
to be on June 1st after the President's executive order establishing  
the most recent committee expired and the committee member's terms  
were not renewed. The committee had completed three reports requested  
by the Administration -- on IT in the health care sector (pdf), cyber  
security R&D (pdf), and the state of computational science (pdf) --  
and appeared ready to take what they had learned in that process and  
apply it to a review of the overall federal IT R&D portfolio when  
their charter lapsed. Despite prodding from a number of different  
sources, including questions at a recent hearing by House Science  
Committee Chairman Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY) to the Director of the  
White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, John Marburger,  
the President opted to allow the review to stop and the committee  
memberships to expire.

This is very disappointing for the computing research community,  
which endured two years after President Bush was elected in which the  
statutorily-madated committee was chartered but was without members  
(the President didn't name the most recent PITAC members until May  
28, 2003). PITAC performs an important cross-check on the federal  
Networking and Information Technology R&D program -- the overall  
federal IT R&D program -- serving as a largely independent review of  
the interagency planning process. The most recent PITAC was directed  
to review slivers of that process and in doing so, learned that the  
federal IT R&D landscape had changed considerably since the last  
"full" review of the program by the last PITAC in 1999.

At the last full meeting of the most recent committee, there appeared  
to be consensus among the members that because work on the three  
reports requested by the President was then complete, it was time to  
turn the committee's attention to the full portfolio, executing their  
statutory obligation to assess the overall federal investment in IT  
R&D and applying the lessons they'd learned in the process of  
completing the three requested reports. The last report on the  
overall portfolio, the '99 PITAC report "Investing in Our Future,"  
found that the nation was considerably underinvested in IT R&D given  
the "spectacular" return on the federal investment in long-term IT  
R&D. That committee's recommendations included specific funding  
levels for the program through FY 2004 -- funding levels that the  
federal government has never met (the FY 2006 budget request is still  
$527 million short of the PITAC recommendation for FY 04).

There is undoubtedly concern within the Administration whether a new  
review of the overall IT R&D portfolio would find similar problems  
with the current federal effort, perhaps recommending funding  
increases that would prove politically challenging in the current  
budget environment. But as we've noted here frequently, the federal  
landscape for computing research has changed dramatically since that  
last review -- agencies that have typically been strong supporters of  
university computing research have significantly curtailed that  
research, other agencies have stepped up their investments  
considerably, policy changes at agencies across the board have  
affected the character of the research that's funded. The most recent  
PITAC reports show the evidence of all of those changes. It not only  
makes sense for PITAC to undertake a review of the overall portfolio,  
it is, in fact, what PITAC was chartered by Congress (in the original  
1991 High Performance Computing Act) to do. This point is emphasized  
in the High Performance Computing Authorization Act of 2005, already  
approved by the House, which would require that PITAC undertake such  
a review every two years.

So, I hope that the President acts quickly to either re-charter the  
committee and reinstate the current members (who have climbed a steep  
learning curve in learning about the intricacies of federal IT R&D  
portfolio) or to move swiftly to name new members of equal stature to  
the committee to undertake the review of the overall effort that's  
sorely needed. As Congress continues to demonstrate its concern with  
the current state of computer science research in the U.S., the one  
advisory body most well-suited to the task of assessing that state  
shouldn't be allowed to lapse.

-Peter Harsha



--
Peter Harsha
Director of Government Affairs
Computing Research Association
1100 17th St. NW, Suite 507
Washington, DC 20036
p: 202.234.2111 ext 106
c: 202.256.8271
CRA's Computing Research Policy Blog: http://www.cra.org/govaffairs/blog



-------------------------------------
You are subscribed as lists-ip () insecure org
To manage your subscription, go to
  http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip

Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/