Only about 4,000 federal jobs were put up for public-private competition under the Bush administration’s competitive sourcing initiative in 2007, far short of the 18,000 positions agencies had earmarked for competition.

Administration officials blamed congressional restrictions for the slowdown in competitions. They said they will continue to push the initiative because it saves money, whether federal employees or contractors win the jobs.

Unions representing federal workers dispute the claims of savings.

Many contractors have shied away from the competitions because federal employees won more than 80% of them in some years. Last year, federal employees won 73% of the work that was competed, according to the Office of Management and Budget’s annual report to Congress.

From now on, “Sensitive But Unclassified Information” (SBU) is known as “Controlled Unclassified Information” (CUI).

In a memorandum to department and agency heads, President Bush said the new designation is intended to standardize the many markings used by different agencies to denote such information. The president said CUI is “the single, categorical designation henceforth throughout the executive branch.”

There are three different categories of CUI, depending on the sensitivity of the information.

David Bibb was named acting administrator of GSA after Lurita Doan was forced to resign.

Bibb, a career federal employee, has served as deputy to the last two administrators and was acting administrator for seven months before Doan took over.