Reps. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., and Mark Meadows, R-N.C., introduced legislation Feb. 13 to codify the General Services Administration (GSA) Technology Transformation Services (TTS) Centers of Excellence (CoE) program.
The Modernization CoE Program Act is a “light touch” bill that would streamline executive agencies’ ability to adopt modern technology, the sponsors said.
“I applaud the work that the Centers of Excellence have already completed and look forward to codifying this program. This bill and these centers will to continue to save money for the American taxpayer and bring state of the art technology to our Federal government,” Khanna said.
Under this legislation, CoE would become responsible for helping agencies:
- Modernize IT and citizen interactions;
- Improve cooperation between the private sector and agency IT;
- Implement cloud, customer communication tools, contact centers, data management tools, and infrastructure optimization;
- Share best practices and expertise; and
- Any other responsibilities identified by the Director of TTS.
“By bringing the best of private sector innovation to the Federal government’s IT systems, these Centers of Excellence will allow agencies to better communicate with the Americans they serve, all while saving the taxpayer tens of millions by making agencies more efficient. IT modernization is increasingly important for innovations both within and outside government,” Rep. Meadows said of the legislation.
The current CoE program features six centers – artificial intelligence (AI), cloud adoption, contact center, customer experience, data and analytics, and infrastructure optimization – that agencies can tap to enable tech transformation that leverages private sector innovation.
The CoE partnership with the Department of Agriculture alone has generated $43 million in cost savings. TTS has also worked with the Department of Housing and Urban Development, Office of Personnel Management, Consumer Product Safety Commission, and Department of Defense’s Joint AI Center.
GSA did not provide comment today on the legislation.
