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9 ideas posted

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Department/Agency:

Navy

City:

Bremerton

Ideas contributed by Community Member

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  Ideas to Make Other Parts of Government More Efficient and Effective »

  Metrics on how well the gov't is doing

  Metrics on how well the gov't is doing should be kept is there is a desire to improve. I believe it was homeland security that had the color coded system that tells you the threat level. USA.gov has some dashboards for specific areas like how we are doing on medicare. Comprehensive metrics should be kept for each agency. Like how are we doing educating the young, is Health and Human Services effective in reducing ...more »

  Metrics on how well the gov't is doing should be kept is there is a desire to improve. I believe it was homeland security that had the color coded system that tells you the threat level. USA.gov has some dashboards for specific areas like how we are doing on medicare.

  Comprehensive metrics should be kept for each agency. Like how are we doing educating the young, is Health and Human Services effective in reducing the number of people on assistance, and is the DOD effective in managing new weapons contracts?

  It shouldn't be too hard to come up with metrics to apply, just basic simple things like return on the money spent, how many people employed, how many contractors, have programs accomplished goals or been completed on time, etcc...

  Just have a place to rate departments of gov't in one place to see where the squeeky wheel is. Kind of pointless to make improvements if you don't have a baseline idea and idea where you want to go.

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  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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  Increasing Trade, Exports, and Overall Competitiveness »

  Improve FAA Victor airways system

  Commercial flights generally flight the victor federal airways. The airways have bends in them from time to time which required course corrections by the pilots. For example, a flight from LA to Boston may have 3-4 course corrections to stay on the Victor federal airways vice a direct point to point routing. This course correction requires extra fuel, time, and cost to the operators. The idea (which is not original ...more »

  Commercial flights generally flight the victor federal airways. The airways have bends in them from time to time which required course corrections by the pilots. For example, a flight from LA to Boston may have 3-4 course corrections to stay on the Victor federal airways vice a direct point to point routing.

  This course correction requires extra fuel, time, and cost to the operators.

  The idea (which is not original but is taking decades to implement) is to straighten out the victor federal airways to allow for point to point flights.

  To accomplish that the navagation system needs to upgraded. There needs to be a date written that after that the NDB, and legacy systems will be turned off for cost savings to support the new systems. Most likely a version of GPS.

  Might as well get rid of most verbal communication and replace with digital TEXT. The messages can be sent efficiently, with greater comprehension, retention, and better use of limited bandwidth.

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  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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  Ideas to Make Other Parts of Government More Efficient and Effective »

  Consolidate intelligence agencies

  A recent article in the Washington Post pointed out that 1,271 gov't organizations work on programs related to homeland security and/or intelligence. In addition to that 1,931 private companies have contracts in this area.

  Certainly, alot of these organizations could be consolidated and/or abolished. I am no fan of contract work. I would trim back contract work as much as possible.

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  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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  Consolidate agencies OPM and local dept HR

  From my view point at the bottom looking up, there seems to be duplication of gov't human resources function. The Office of Personnel and each agency has their own personnel dept.

  I can't see any value in having the duplication in function. I would suggest to get rid of the local HR departments.

  2 comments for Idea: Consolidate agencies OPM and local dept HR

  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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  Provide internet printing ability at USPS

  Now, as has been since the beginning, a physical letter is mailed and the USPS carries it to the destination. The USPS has lost a large portion of the business to the internet and e-mail. I suggest that a hybrid system be available. In certain applications, information would be electronically sent to post offices in large cities then printed out and delivered. This system could be used for utility bills, mass mailing, ...more »

  Now, as has been since the beginning, a physical letter is mailed and the USPS carries it to the destination. The USPS has lost a large portion of the business to the internet and e-mail.

  I suggest that a hybrid system be available. In certain applications, information would be electronically sent to post offices in large cities then printed out and delivered. This system could be used for utility bills, mass mailing, or just about anything. For example if you mail a letter from LA to Boston, instead of the physical letter being put on a airplane and trucks and handled, the information is sent electronically from LA to Boston, printed out and delivered.

  The time it would take for a letter to be sent would decrease, the USPS should be able to give a discount for using the electronic method, and fuel and labor costs would be less.

  A side benefit would be that there would be Postal centers with internet access. These could also be used for gov't workers to telecommute. The post offices could be used to gather weather data, air monitoring, earthquake monitoring, or similar information that could be shared on the internet with other gov't agencies.

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  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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  Improve NMCI network

  Problems with the NMCI computer network have been identified by the GAO in a 2006 report "NMCI has not met its two strategic goals—to provide information superiority and to foster innovation via interoperability and shared services." At a fundamental level the unique needs of the government are not understood by a contractor. Going forward, changes need to be made to if the original goals will ever be achieved. An ...more »

  Problems with the NMCI computer network have been identified by the GAO in a 2006 report "NMCI has not met its two strategic goals—to provide information

  superiority and to foster innovation via interoperability and shared services." At a fundamental level the unique needs of the government are not understood by a contractor. Going forward, changes need to be made to if the original goals will ever be achieved.

  An assessment of the system status should be done from the top down. The role of a contractor really needs to completely changed. The lead role should be the gov't. The contractor can maintain the system hardware and software but operation of the system should be performed by the gov't. The idea would be to leverage the strengths of each organization. One suggestion is to use a variety of contractors that do various things well. For example, Cisco for networking, HP for server farms, IBM for project admin, etc...

  Technology needs to be used to bring everyone into the system. It's silly to have a Navy Marine network when not all of the Navy and Marines are on the network.

  The software and hardware used is generationally challenged. Rather than change out the thousands of PC's every 3-4 years, a systemic change to move more applications to the cloud could allow the applications be kept to the most up to date. So the software on the cloud in updated, vice thousands of individual PCs.

  Serious consideration should be made to break with the Microsoft OS. Other operating systems can be used for servers, and/or users. Places such as Spain and Germany use Linux for some of the gov't operations. For example, Internet Explorer is the default internet browser used on computer systems. The latest version (IE9) tested as the slowest of the browsers in general use and is used by choice by less than 50% of the general population.

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  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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  Increasing Trade, Exports, and Overall Competitiveness »

  Improve shipping ports to support transport ships

  The trend is toward larger and larger container ships. As the ships become larger fewer American ports support the shipping operation. Currently on the list of world's busiest ports, the highest USA port is LA at 16th. In the past shipping operations have been abondoned in San Francisco, and Manhatton due to logicstics and the ships growing in size. Having a port close to a factory that can support large ships to the ...more »

  The trend is toward larger and larger container ships. As the ships become larger fewer American ports support the shipping operation. Currently on the list of world's busiest ports, the highest USA port is LA at 16th. In the past shipping operations have been abondoned in San Francisco, and Manhatton due to logicstics and the ships growing in size. Having a port close to a factory that can support large ships to the rest of world is an advantage to off-shore manufacturers to reduce the cost of shipping.

  It is problematic to have all ports configured to accomidate the largest ships due to physical limitations. A comprehensive shipping plan would be to designate 2-4 ports on each coast as primary ports to support the largest ships. The system would be similar to the hub and spoke airline system. From each port, connections are made to feeder ships, trains, air freight, and trucks.

  The point is if the USA is going to improve export effectiveness a systemic comprehensive plan on getting goods to market should be developed and a maintenance plan to constantly improve and upkeep the infrastructure.

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  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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  Use compostable disposable cups, plates, utensils, and napkins

  Most disposable cups, utensils (knives, forks, and spoons) are not compostable. When they are thrown away into the landfil they decay at a very slow rate. Even paper cups have a coating to prevent them from roting. The plastic that makes the disposable items is made from petroleum (oil). The USA currently imports a large percentage of petroleum used from foreign countries. By using compostable disposable Cups (corn ...more »

  Most disposable cups, utensils (knives, forks, and spoons) are not compostable. When they are thrown away into the landfil they decay at a very slow rate. Even paper cups have a coating to prevent them from roting. The plastic that makes the disposable items is made from petroleum (oil). The USA currently imports a large percentage of petroleum used from foreign countries.

  By using compostable disposable Cups (corn cups) and other items, the USA decreases it reliance on foreign imported oil. The disposable compostable items are made from corn, potatos, and recycled paper. Buying these products is better for the environment by not using landfill space. This would also create demand for products that can be made in the USA from crops and recycled materials.

  There are some Companies that promote the use of compostable items, for example Tullys coffee. I suggest that the gov't adopt a policy to use compostable disposable cups, plates, and utensils.

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  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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  Cancel DTS travel system

  The Defense Travel System (DTS) doesn't seem to me to save any money. It would seem to be more expense than the old system. The computer interface is clumsy and difficult to use. There is a lengthly process to use the system. I cannot count how many times it has crashed or the system is down. After implementing the system additional people were assigned to departments as travel coordinators to help people process ...more »

  The Defense Travel System (DTS) doesn't seem to me to save any money. It would seem to be more expense than the old system. The computer interface is clumsy and difficult to use. There is a lengthly process to use the system. I cannot count how many times it has crashed or the system is down. After implementing the system additional people were assigned to departments as travel coordinators to help people process through DTS. Several times I have used the system there have been errors, including, not having reservations made. So you would show up at the airport thinking you were ready to go and DTS hadn't made the reservation for the flight. There is some bug with it talking to SATO. Just kill DTS, and have travel coordinators process the travel. The traveler fills out a travel request and the whole process would save millions. I would guess there are probably 3-4 hours spent minimum if everything goes perfect for each trip to use DTS. So figure a 1/2 manday times the thousands of DOD trips and it adds up.

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  1 comment for Idea: Cancel DTS travel system

  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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