President announces creation of new federal Web portal

President Clinton Saturday announced the creation of firstgov.gov, a new Web site intended to be every citizen's window to the federal government.

Clinton's announcement came during his first-ever "Webcast," which occurred at the time of his regular Saturday radio address.

Firstgov.gov will enable citizens to search the full text of every government Web page currently on the Internet-currently estimated to be between 50 to 100 million pages. The site will enable the 110 million Americans currently online to conduct transactions with agencies, such as reserving a campsite at a National Park.

"When it's complete, firstgov will serve as a single point of entry to one of the largest, perhaps the most useful collection of Web pages in the entire world," Clinton said in the Webcast. "Whether you want crucial information in starting a small business, or you want to track your Social Security benefits, you can do it all in one place, 24 hours a day, seven days a week."

Firstgov.gov also will centralize the government's grant application and award process. The federal government distributes roughly $300 billion per year in grants to private citizens, community groups and state and local governments.

Another key goal of the site will be to facilitate electronic purcashing by agencies. All federal procurement opportunities above $25,000 will be listed on Firstgov.gov, and the bid and award process for such purchases will take place online through the site.

The administration hopes to have 75 to 90 percent of federal grants online by the end of the year, said Sally Katzen, counselor to the director of the Office of Management and Budget and nominee to be its deputy director for management. The firstgov.gov timeline also calls for more than 20 agencies representing two thirds of federal procurement dollars to be up by that time, she said.

"Our hope is to move to a paperless procurement environment," Katzen said, "and to do it in a way where small businesses and others are not disadvantaged."

Both the grant and procurement aspects of the site will be implemented as small-scale pilot projects initially and should be functional by the end of the year. The portal and search aspects of the site will be operational in the fall.

Firstgov.gov will be financed through a grant from Eric Brewer, chief scientist at Inktomi Corp., an Internet search company that handles roughly half of all search queries. The site will be administered and developed by a non-profit organization created for the task. Brewer will bankroll the site for two years, at which time the government will evaluate how well the site is achieving its goals.

"Two years is an eternity in Internet time," said David Barram, administrator of the General Services Administration.

Firstgov.gov supersedes GSA's plan to create a federal portal called WebGov. The government's CIO Council will have a role in helping mobilize any necessary cross-agency activities required by the new site.