Chopra joined other Obama appointees at a hearing on May 19 of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation. The committee asked him just one question -- about using IT to improve rural health care. Chopra answered that as CTO he would work on the issue.
In Virginia, Chopra championed projects such as the Physics Flexbook, a Web-based open source textbook that supplements existing materials. He backed a social network built on Ning to connect health-care clinicians in small towns. He also initiated a scorecard system to rate the performance of Virginia's state agencies, and launched a one-stop Web site for business-to-government transactions and services. Last year the National Association of State Chief Information Officers awarded Virginia first-place honors for technology management.
"We worked to build a culture of innovation in the public sector that saw state employees translate simple ideas into funded prototypes expected to 4 to 1 return on taxpayer investment and aligned directly with legislative and executive priorities," Chopra told the committee.
Federal News Radio reported Monday that U.S. Rep. Gerry Connelly, D-Va., introduced a bill to "codify" the job roles of the CTO and CIO that President Barack Obama created by executive order. Vivek Kundra is currently the federal CIO.