Justice, OMB programs named semifinalists for innovation award
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Justice's Global Justice XML Data Model and OMB's Program Assessment Ratings Tool are among 10 semifinalists for Innovation in American Government awards.
The Justice Department's Global Justice Extensible Markup Language Data Model and the Office of Management and Budget's Program Assessment Ratings Tool (PART) are among 10 semifinalists from federal agencies and 50 overall for the six $100,000 Innovation in American Government awards.
The Ash Institute for Democratic Governance and Innovation at Harvard University and the Council for Excellence in Government sponsor the awards. The finalists will be named in April and six grants awarded at a ceremony July 27.
The Global Justice XML Data Model is a joint venture between Justice and the Department of Homeland Security to improve information-sharing among federal, state, local and tribal programs by developing a general data model [See GCN story].
OMB is using PART to assess every federal program over a five-year period to make sure the programs are meeting their intended goals.
Along with these two projects, the other eight federal agency initiatives that made the semifinals are the:
- Agency for International Development's Global Development Alliance, which links U.S. foreign assistance with resources from business, nongovernmental organizations and charities for international development and humanitarian activities.
- Department of Health and Human Services' Grants.gov, which created a single, secure Web site to find and apply for federal grants.
- Department of Housing and Urban Development's HOME Investment Partnerships Program, which expanded the inventory of rental housing and increased home ownership opportunities for low-income families.
- Justice's Regional Computer Forensics Laboratory Program, which is a national network of digital evidence that is available for all governmental law enforcement organizations.
- Environmental Protection Agency's Regulations.gov, which is a one-stop shop for the federal rulemaking process by letting citizens find and comment on potential rules.
- Library of Congress' Veterans History Project, which collects first-hand accounts of wartime veterans and civilian service workers from World War I on.
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Laboratory Response Network, which is a collaboration of 140 state and local public health laboratories as well as federal, international and military labs that test for biological and chemical agents associated with terrorism or other public health emergencies.
- Department of Veterans Affairs' Managing Violence in High-Risk Medical Patients, which is used by all VA hospitals and reduces the risk of violent behavior from patients to health care providers.