Government tech chief to leave post this year

Chief Technology Officer Todd Park will step down from his post in coming weeks, The Hill has confirmed.

A source familiar with the matter said that Park, who has been in the job since taking over for Aneesh Chopra in 2012, will serve in a new role, working with the White House from Silicon Valley to gather top programmers and other tech specialists to work for the government.

{mosads}Park and his family are expected to move to California by the end of the month, in time for his children to start school.

The source told The Hill that Park’s decision was inspired in large part by his family’s decision to move back to California.

Park was a driving force behind the White House’s creation of a new digital strike team based around former Google programmer Mikey Dickerson that aims to make the government more tech friendly. In his new role, Park will try to build that team and make sure Washington understands how technology is developing. 

A formal announcement could come as soon as next week.

The move will open the door for a third technology chief at the White House. According to Fortune, which first reported the news on Friday, the White House has had discussions with people from Google, Twitter and LinkedIn about a possible replacement. 

Park, the founder of health technology company Athenahealth, joined the Obama administration in 2009 as chief technology officer of the Department of Health and Human Services.

In his current post, he helped lead the effort to fix HealthCare.gov after its troubled rollout and has also been a vocal proponent of releasing federal government data to the public and using technology to increase the efficiency of the federal government. 

—Last updated at 5:24 p.m.