26February96 Benchmark Notes To: "USGS Employees" From: " benchmark, Reston, VA " (Benchmark Notes) Subject: 26February96 Benchmark Notes X-Mailer: TO: All USGS Employees FROM: Director SUBJECT: 26February96 Benchmark Notes To send E-mail to me or my immediate staff, please use one of the following addresses: SMTP: BENCHMRK@USGS.GOV Groupwise: INTERNET:BENCHMRK@USGS.GOV Banyan Vines: BENCHMRK CCMail: SMTP_MAIL BENCHMRK@USGS.GOV Please share this message with other employees. ----------------------------------------------------------------- Your Comments are Important I want to open this note by thanking all of you who responded to my request for feedback in the December and January Notes. Your responses were quite evenly distributed across the whole of the USGS, both geographically and organizationally. Your many positive comments were encouraging, your suggestions for improvement and for future topics of the notes were recorded with enthusiasm, and your thoughts on unexpected impacts of the furlough were thoughtful and worthwhile. I encourage you to continue sharing your views. These notes always list the e-mail addresses that will reach me. I value your comments and suggestions on how we might continue to improve our communication with each other. Welcome to Former U.S. Bureau of Mines Employees Late last month, I joined U.S. Bureau of Mines Director Rhea Graham, Chief Geologist Pat Leahy, and other Geologic Division staff in a ceremony at the National Center to mark the transfer of minerals information activities from the USBM to the USGS. More than 190 Federal and contract employees, in administration as well as minerals information, were transferred from the USBM to the USGS in Reston and Denver. In many ways, the ceremony was a homecoming; the USBM was one of several agencies formed at the beginning of this century as spinoffs from the USGS. Please join me in saying to these folks, welcome back to the USGS! Budget News As you all know, the budget picture this year has been frustrating and confusing. At present, the USGS is funded through a continuing resolution, or CR, that expires on March 15. The funding level at which we are operating under the current CR is the FY 95 enacted level--that is, the same as our funding last year. At this point, my best guess is that we will not have an actual appropriation in the usual sense this year but will be funded instead through one or more continuing resolutions for the rest of FY 96. But it remains a very fluid situation, and changes can happen extremely quickly. In the meantime, the FY 97 budget process is continuing. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has given us their comments on our proposed budget for FY 97, and we are responding to their comments in preparation for budget hearings in Congress, which are scheduled for late March. I will keep you informed as the budget picture unfolds. Early indications from OMB suggest relatively static funding for FY 97. Keep in mind, however, that we are in the very early stages of the budget cycle, and changes are probable. Regional Directors Named After comprehensive discussion, deliberation, and a series of personal interviews, the Policy Council has selected three people to serve as the USGS Regional Directors. In addition to recommending the individuals to fill these positions, the Council also reevaluated the title of Regional Deputy to the Director and renamed the position to avoid confusion about the relationship of the regional positions within the Director's Office. I am very pleased to inform you that the three Regional Directors will be Katherine F. Lins - Eastern Region; Douglas R. Posson - Central Region; and Thomas J. Casadevall - Western Region. As members of the Benchmark Team on Strategic Planning, Katherine, Doug and Tom have been instrumental in crafting a report that will set the course of the USGS toward the year 2005. Their breadth of experience within the USGS, coupled with the comprehensive knowledge gained through participation in the strategic planning process, will be of enormous benefit to the organization as we move into the future. Please welcome Katherine, Doug and Tom in their new roles and give them your support in carrying out their important assignment for the USGS. As an initial introduction, please meet: KATHERINE F. LINS -- Katherine joined the USGS in 1971 as a member of the research staff of the Geographic Applications Program. Her work over the years has focused on airborne and spaceborne remote sensing systems for mapping land use and land cover. Katherine has served as a project leader for a number of multiagency environmental projects and workshops in collaboration with USGS programs and outside organizations such as the New England River Basin Commission and the Missouri River Basin Commission. Most recently, Katherine worked in the National Mapping Division Office of Strategic Analysis, where she served as Acting Chief prior to NMD's headquarters reorganization. While with that office, she served on the NMD Reorganization Task Force, which analyzed and presented organizational assessment issues that now form the basis for a major refocus of the National Mapping Program to improve its responsiveness to changing requirements of an increasingly complex map user community. Katherine also served as the Land Use Land Cover Program Coordinator, where she had primary responsibility for working with Federal and State representatives to coordinate and analyze a multiagency national survey of land use and land cover requirements. She was instrumental in developing a funding initiative for producing the base cartographic data for the Nation, a starting point for much of the National Spatial Data Infrastructure data sharing arrangements in place today. One of Katherine's most important assignments has been to serve as one of the tri-chairs for the Benchmark Strategic Planning Team. DOUGLAS R. POSSON -- Doug joined the USGS in 1973 as a computer systems analyst working on hydrologic database applications and ground-water modeling projects in the Water Resources Division New Mexico District Office. His teamwork in the district and as the first Central Region computer specialist led to a program management position with the implementation of WRD's Distributed Information System on Prime Computers. After 13 years in WRD, Doug moved to the Information Systems Division (ISD) where he attained the position of Associate Division Chief and Deputy Assistant Director for Information Systems. He returned to Denver for 5 years as Chief of ISD's Office of Field Services, where he was responsible for information technology services to USGS offices in western States. He represented DOI and USGS data and information interests in interagency and international programs, including the Global Change Research Program. Doug has been the Acting Chief, Central Region Office of Program Support, following the consolidation and reorganization of the Administrative and Information Systems Divisions. Doug's interests have centered on interdivisional activities, and he has worked effectively to promote the use of information technology for the benefit of USGS programs. He served as cochair of the NMD National Performance Review team, which recommended migrating to print-on-demand for maps and USGS reports. Doug also chairs the Arctic Environmental Data Team (involving Federal science agencies, universities and international organizations), which was instrumental in developing the Arctic Data Interactive CD-ROM, a prototype journal of scientific data that received the Presidential Design Achievement Award in 1994. THOMAS J. CASADEVALL -- Tom started his career with the USGS as a postdoctoral research fellow in 1976. After a year as adjunct professor at the Escuela Politecnica Nacional in Ecuador, Tom rejoined the USGS, and since 1978, he has worked in the Volcano Hazards Program in various positions ranging from staff geologist and project chief to Assistant Branch Chief. Tom's work has taken him all over the world as a member of research teams working at active volcanoes in Italy, Iceland, Central America, the Philippines, Colombia, Zaire and the West Indies. In 1991, Tom assisted with the USGS response to the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo, including 5 weeks as USGS field coordinator. His work there was recognized by the Department of the Interior with a Special Achievement Award and by the Philippine aviation community. Most recently Tom has served as the Project Chief for Volcanic Hazards and Aviation Safety responsible for maintaining and coordinating activities with other federal agencies and with non-governmental groups in the area of aviation safety. Tom is a recognized expert worldwide for his work on volcanic hazards. His efforts led to the First International Symposium on Volcanic Ash and Aviation Safety, held in 1991, which was recognized by the aviation industry as the first coordinated exchange of information on the threat that volcanic ash poses to air safety. Katherine, Doug, and Tom will assume their new positions in April. They are looking forward to working with the USGS State Representatives and assuming leadership of the Regional Councils to address Bureau issues in the regions. "GORDIE" Pam Malam Staff Assistant for Special Issues Director's Office Phone: (703)648-7415 National Center, Mail Stop 121 Fax: (703)648-4454 Reston, VA 22092 pmalam@usgs.gov