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heather

@hbillings

Former director of engineering for 18F. Friendly curmudgeon, authoritative walker, front-end tinkerer.

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09.01.2025
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Latest posts by heather @hbillings

I haven't worked on a Django app in 8 years. I just opened a terminal and `python manage.py runserver` came flying off my fingers. Hi, my old friend. Maybe people management hasn't totally ruined me.

(Now I'm going to bitch about why on earth `python` is still aliased to Python2 on Mac, tyvm)

24.06.2025 15:44 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Direct File is 'beloved by its users,' internal IRS report says The IRS is reportedly ending the Direct File, but a report obtained via the Freedom of Information Act says that 94% of users rated their experience as β€œexcellent” or β€œabove average.”

"Direct File showed what real government efficiency isβ€”identifying a need and delivering for people in a way that actually makes their lives better.” β€” @merici.bsky.social

16.06.2025 17:44 πŸ‘ 266 πŸ” 56 πŸ’¬ 2 πŸ“Œ 2

I asked for dark mode as in β€œless eye strain” not β€œthe collapse of shared reality and permanent democratic nightfall” just to be clear

27.05.2025 21:49 πŸ‘ 65 πŸ” 8 πŸ’¬ 3 πŸ“Œ 0
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18F files legal challenge A statement about 18F’s appeal filed with the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board.

We have some news to share with you. πŸ₯„

Today we took legal action to challenge our termination, filing an appeal with the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board. We did this because we believe the elimination of 18F violated safeguards that exist to protect a nonpartisan civil service.

28.05.2025 19:25 πŸ‘ 1205 πŸ” 254 πŸ’¬ 16 πŸ“Œ 23
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Working in the open For over 11 years, 18F has been proudly serving the American people to make government technology work better. We are non-partisan civil servants. 18F has worked on hundreds of projects, all designed ...

What does "working transparently" mean, actually? Hint: It's not what DOGE is doing. Here's how 18F infused an ethos of transparency -- and accountability -- into everything we did. 18f.org/working-in-t...

31.03.2025 23:00 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

this is when the internet peaked imo

31.03.2025 18:35 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

Resume-writing is bad enough, but when you're a generalist and a manager, you end up with:
- owned a thing nobody else wanted
- paired with some folks but they didn't really need me
- made shit suck less in some unquantifiable way
- [mumbles in performance management]

hire me I guess?

25.03.2025 21:14 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

I spent the last 9 years of my life in >7 different jobs with 18F. I worked on high-publicity items you've seen in the news and low-profile tools that made life for someone in a back office tolerable.

Pulling off this last IRL is my proudest achievement. I'll miss you all so very, very much. πŸ₯„

04.03.2025 17:41 πŸ‘ 5 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0