Evans new federal IT leader

Karen Evans, Energy Department chief information officer, will replace Mark Forman as the head of federal IT. Evans will take over as Office of Management and Budget's administrator for e-government and IT next month, said Clay Johnson, OMB's deputy director for management, at the Interagency Resources Management Council conference in Cambridge, Md. Johnson said OMB interviewed "a couple" of people for the position, but "Karen became our focus from the beginning, because she was so highly regarded." Evans, who spent 19 months as the Energy CIO, will take over the government's top IT post as 25 Quicksilver e-government initiatives are nearing completion, and the next wave of projects are in the planning stages. In addition to guiding the e-government projects, Evans' priorities will include maintaining the discipline agencies have adopted in the IT planning and budgeting process. Evans is the vice chairwoman of the Federal CIO Council, the principal forum for agency CIOs to develop recommendations for federal IT management policy, procedures and standards.