WASHINGTON-- Edward Francis Meagher, an experienced federal information technology manager, has been named deputy chief information officer for the Department of the Interior.

"It's great to have a seasoned veteran joining Interior to take on a very tough job for the Department of the Interior," Chief Information Officer Hord Tipton said in announcing the selection today. "As deputy chief information officer, Ed will be providing leadership, along with the CIO, to the Department's $1 billion annual Information Technology portfolio."

In his new position, Meagher will also help oversee the acquisition and installation of infrastructure (hardware and software) and applications supporting Interior's varied mission areas, including major investments for recreation, mineral leasing and development, wildland fire management and financial and business management. He will also be assisting the department in meeting IT requirements in security, architecture, capital planning, and records management. He will start at Interior on Feb. 19, 2006.

Before joining Interior, Meagher was the chief technology officer for the Department of Veterans Affairs and previously held the post of deputy CIO at Veterans Affairs, where he also served as acting assistant secretary for Information and Technology, acting chief information officer, and special assistant to the Secretary on Information Technology. His extensive career in the area of Information Technology spans more than 25 years in both the public and private sectors.

Meagher has received numerous awards, including the Federal 100 Award in March 2005, which is presented to the 100 leaders who made a difference in federal information technology during the 2004 calendar year. He also received the coveted FCW Eagle Award presented annually to government and industry representatives who made a particular impact in the government IT community in the previous year.

Meagher is an Air Force veteran who served in Vietnam; he was born in Brooklyn, New York and attended the University of Dayton, Dayton, Ohio.

Interior's deputy chief information officer position was last filled permanently by David Shearer, who left to provide his technical abilities and leadership to the Financial and Business Management System, a key financial and IT reform project for Interior. Since then the position has been filled on a temporary basis by IT managers detailed to the Office of the Chief Information Officer, including Julia Laws, Leslie Cone and Bill Corrington. CIO Tipton thanked Laws, Cone, and Corrington for their contributions during the rigorous selection process.