[{"_1":2,"_88":-5,"_89":-5},"loaderData",{"_3":4,"_26":27},"root",{"_5":6,"_17":10,"_18":19,"_20":21,"_22":10,"_23":-5,"_24":-5,"_25":10},"user",{"_7":8,"_9":10,"_11":10,"_12":-5,"_13":-5,"_14":15,"_16":-5},"roles",[],"isAuthenticated",false,"isPremium","planName","subscriptionStatus","featureFlags",{},"insightsBudget","isDevelopmentHost","userPreferences",{},"recaptchaSiteKey","6LcvOJcUAAAAAHsB-gPGfGktcRlKpH7OTIU_dMTD","isImpersonating","impersonation","affiliateStatus","isFreedomPortal","routes/v2/article/layout",{"_28":29,"_30":31},"notFound",true,"relatedArticles",[32,76],{"_33":34,"_35":36,"_37":38,"_39":40,"_41":42,"_43":44,"_45":46,"_47":48,"_49":50,"_51":52,"_53":54,"_55":56,"_57":58,"_59":60,"_61":62,"_63":64,"_65":66,"_67":68,"_69":70,"_71":72,"_73":74,"_75":74},"mediaId",6317967,"mediaKeyId","2368513-d4c9f45ce3f723e1eaa4a50e29528610","parentId",2368513,"title","Department of State asks for funding to modernize Sunbiz and voter registration systems","audioSeconds",844,"startMs",6194000,"endMs",7038000,"viewUrl","/Search/View?dp=1&key=2368513-d4c9f45ce3f723e1eaa4a50e29528610&start=6194&end=7038","thumbnailUrl","https://assets.pipeline.soar.com/2368513-d4c9f45ce3f723e1eaa4a50e29528610/thumbnail_6194000.jpg","articleUrl","/articles/6317967/Florida/Department-of-State-asks-for-funding-to-modernize-Sunbiz-and-voter-registration-systems","mediaUrl","https://secure.pipeline.soar.com/6317967-99da89ff57b187c9ff5a30de16037823/orig.mp4?Expires=1771140354&Signature=L7aP-2mAA~gR5~PEmKVK~xLHnnZjEYPSRmxZl38uMaEO05pUkRhC1R-jRqRi5ncNNE3t0X~93V4Rg0DEFXNSfkNYPR34vlww54ZXl60spBDYs5xkjdevmzPwg0Ck1Rsys241VPMQv4pNbdVJ4YF1MabHFXr307sYCpxWujXaun2beeY5O-hPw~BurUFssu98diTwcmQjNhZgXHEtympqaHBIacNBND-2QXY6QZ8Z5ujdddHoqq1cL8DEJ5OIXQJ4j2L0EV0E3agmxUIEkscrJwB18P8yAxpbjZjdytzGnwcOekD-lNhIZUMqm2DKS5QkxDtA6PjPgp8uEqU1TkAPYA__&Key-Pair-Id=KUT5TJCACFTXG","author","Florida Legislature","date","2025-02-20T00:00:00Z","article","The Florida Department of State requested funding on Tuesday to modernize two legacy systems used by residents and businesses across the state: Sunbiz, the Division of Corporations' business registry, and the statewide voter registration system.

Secretary of State Cord Byrd told the House Information Technology Budget and Policy Subcommittee that Sunbiz was established in 1991, now supports more than 3.5 million business entities and generates more than $575 million in general revenue annually, and that its underlying database and codebase are now decades old. \"Sunbiz is 34 years old... Over half a billion dollars annually to the state are reliant upon a system that is older than cell phones and the public Internet,\" Byrd said.

The department asked for $800,000 in recurring general revenue to implement a password-protected account capability for electronic filings and $5,000,000 in nonrecurring general revenue to resume a competitive procurement process for a modern replacement of Sunbiz. Byrd said the department already migrated the legacy system to a new virtualized environment (in cooperation with Florida Digital Service and the Northwest Regional Data Center) that runs \"five times faster than the physical hardware\" and reduces hardware-failure risk, but that a full modernization is still required.

Byrd described prior modernization efforts that were suspended after vendor disruptions: work funded in 2019–2020 was halted when the selected vendor was acquired and essential project personnel left, and the project was later canceled. The department noted that three independent assessments concluded the business registry application is not sustainable in its current form and recommended unification and modernization.

Acting CIO George Brown and Assistant Secretary Jennifer Kennedy answered committee questions about account protections and timelines. Brown said some specialized account types (for example, the state's notary education account) already use passwords; he said the department can provide a count of accounts now protected by passwords on request. The department said the virtualized environment now uses a supported relational database (the legacy system was reported as running on Oracle) and that any migration to SQL Server will use a current, supported version determined at conversion time.

On elections, Byrd said the statewide Florida Voter Registration System (FDRS) — created after the 2005 legislative mandate and codified at section 98.035, Florida Statutes — also needs modernization. The department received $450,000 in 2022–2023 to conduct a feasibility study that produced business, functional and technical requirements; the Division of Elections is now requesting $2,494,800 nonrecurring and $44,000 recurring to competitively procure a solution to modernize FDRS. Byrd told lawmakers a modernized voter-registration system would increase efficiency, improve data security and reduce manual processes counties must perform when legislative changes occur.

Lawmakers asked procedural and technical questions: how many Sunbiz accounts currently have passwords (department staff said they would provide a count), whether the department has a timeline and project metrics (the department offered to share its project schedule and metrics with the committee), and how records related to voter re-enfranchisement (for former felons) could be integrated. Byrd said information used to determine voting eligibility for returning citizens typically resides with the clerks of court and Department of Corrections and would require coordination across those offices.

The department characterized its requests as modest relative to Sunbiz revenue: Byrd said the $5,000,000 nonrecurring request is roughly equivalent to \"one week's revenue\" collected by Sunbiz. Committee members asked for the feasibility study, procurement timeline, and account-protection counts; Secretary Byrd and staff said they would provide that information to the subcommittee.

The Department of State presentations closed the hearing; the committee thanked presenters and requested follow-up materials before taking further action on new appropriations.","mediaType","Video","parentTitle","Information Technology Budget & Policy Subcommittee - February 20, 2025","oneSentenceSummary","The Department of State told a House subcommittee that Sunbiz — the state's 34-year-old business registry — needs modernization and password protections, and requested funding to continue procurement work on Sunbiz and to modernize the statewide voter registration system.","taxTitle","2025 Legislature FL, Florida","taxId",78546,"location","Florida","headline","","shortSummary",{"_33":77,"_35":36,"_37":38,"_39":78,"_41":79,"_43":80,"_45":81,"_47":82,"_49":83,"_51":84,"_53":85,"_55":56,"_57":58,"_59":86,"_61":62,"_63":64,"_65":87,"_67":68,"_69":70,"_71":72,"_73":74,"_75":74},6317973,"Florida agencies report progress on cloud migration as lawmakers press for cost, inventory details",6213,83000,6296000,"/Search/View?dp=1&key=2368513-d4c9f45ce3f723e1eaa4a50e29528610&start=83&end=6296","https://assets.pipeline.soar.com/2368513-d4c9f45ce3f723e1eaa4a50e29528610/thumbnail_83000.jpg","/articles/6317973/Florida/Florida-agencies-report-progress-on-cloud-migration-as-lawmakers-press-for-cost-inventory-details","https://secure.pipeline.soar.com/6317973-68de166bd2bc2fd53973f05e1db4905d/orig.mp4?Expires=1771140354&Signature=HkWyqREo0bv6fwljkpQ7ynyamD9-FsAeN5Kf5r1B8eTslDQouJGHCpXBfqKHdpMvZlJLtjwVmMhIGx5~Zlz1~41k0v7l~jBBiAJYrf3EszM3m62KZPiYS74fp5J2Sn7CkOFSYVXve0RUCeTTzwoZZ0A9~hgSGhRfM2KG-m-ZhaSDHK94oISeTVDuglAQvZgPRk~bYodPvg7L9nICbmrQDCCAaFNkj3kD-DFvbwatiEHpQVLovhGyurKQjWpEgMigtQJpdZiuTmN9zx6ljTWueHTgn2zgYYkBNEP~MwVWAXePq1vQAFQWXm9Pvm53MAf~WKc9XJWn8sWKG8DCbr~Xkg__&Key-Pair-Id=KUT5TJCACFTXG","Members of the Florida House Information Technology Budget and Policy Subcommittee heard an interagency panel Tuesday on the state's multi-year effort to move agency applications and data to cloud platforms, with officials reporting progress on several projects but acknowledging gaps in a statewide inventory and in agency-level cost analyses.

The discussion matters because the cloud migration affects mission-critical systems across state government — from public health records and child-protection case management to corrections and transportation financial systems — and because legislative funding decisions will shape whether agencies can modernize, maintain security, and limit costs. Lawmakers repeatedly asked for clearer cost comparisons, data-transfer estimates, service-level commitments and a complete application inventory.

Warren Sponholtz, State Chief Information Officer for Florida Digital Service, told the committee the cloud offers scalability and moves spending from capital to operating models: \"the cloud is in simplest terms, servers and computers that run in a different location,\" he said, and can reduce some costs while increasing flexibility. Tim Brown, assistant vice president of the Northwest Regional Data Center (NW RDC), summarized the data center's cloud readiness assessment: 24 agencies submitted information on roughly 890 applications, and NW RDC recommended a two-phase migration strategy that initially targets lower-risk transitions to build experience.

Department of Corrections CIO Ken Kisha described a 3-year cloud modernization program for the agency's legacy applications, saying the effort will modernize about 98 legacy applications (86 for the Department of Corrections and 12 for the Florida Commission on Offender Review), and is integrated with the OBIS (offender-based information system) modernization. Kisha said 5 applications have been delivered so far, 7 are planned for custom builds, 17 are slated for commercial off-the-shelf replacement, 15 will migrate as part of OBIS, and 19 have been identified for decommissioning. He told members the program has been allocated about $83,600,000 and described the migration as ongoing.

Jeremy Daniel, CIO for the Department of Elder Affairs, said DOEA began work on a Power Platform modernization in 2024 and completed proof-of-concept work for three applications. He provided line-item figures for current and expected expenditures (contractors: about $350,000 to date; training: about $19,000; licensing/maintenance: about $1.3 million; total to date about $1.7 million) and said additional contractor, licensing and development costs are planned for the next 12 months.

The Department of Health received multiyear funding of $18,850,000, Deputy Secretary Antonio Dawkins said. Health projects include a statewide health-management system being reworked to unify records across 67 county health departments (scheduled for final migration after pilots in 2025–2026) and a rearchitecture of the Child Protection Team information system. FDOT executive director of transportation technology Trey Tillander described a long-running modernization program (since 2019) across hundreds of applications and said FDOT has about $15 million appropriated for 10 cloud modernization projects; he also reported his agency's Azure tenant is incurring roughly $110,000 per month in cloud costs.

Tim Brown emphasized choices and tradeoffs in the assessment: agencies identified transition strategies such as rehosting, replatforming and rearchitecting; NW RDC found 34% of submitted applications will require rearchitecting and 21% rehosting, and that 46% of applications scored in the combined medium‑to‑high transition-effort category while 43% were in the riskiest categories. Brown also said the cloud readiness study focused on applications housed at the Southwood location of NW RDC and should not be taken as an inventory of every state application.

Lawmakers repeatedly pressed officials on two recurring issues: (1) a statewide, authoritative inventory of applications and (2) clear, comparable total-cost-of-ownership figures that include cloud licensing, ongoing operations, and data egress/ingress charges. Brown and Sponholtz said FLDS is building a data catalog focused on data elements, while NW RDC's work focused on application-level rationalization; both efforts overlap but are distinct. Brown said NW RDC and agencies are taking steps to consolidate cloud tenants to negotiate better pricing and that NW RDC acts as a cloud broker for some agencies while other agencies manage their own cloud tenants.

Committee members also raised operational and security concerns: who maintains backups and disaster recovery, whether agencies are using centralized authentication or single sign-on, whether agencies account for latency and data-transfer costs, and how SLAs are defined. Brown said NW RDC provides planned-downtime notifications two weeks to one day in advance and hourly updates during outages; he said standard availability expectations discussed with agencies target 99.9% and that SLAs are application-specific. Sponholtz said agencies remain primarily responsible for their databases but FLDS is working to improve interoperability and enterprise architecture.

The subcommittee requested additional, agency-level details: up-to-date application inventories, per-application cost analyses (including projected recurring cloud costs and expected savings or efficiencies), and clarifications of which tenants are managed by agencies versus NW RDC. Chair Snyder said the committee will continue to work with agencies to build an enterprise approach. The panelists were dismissed after roughly two hours of presentations and questioning.

Looking ahead, lawmakers signaled they will ask for more detailed documentation — including the NW RDC report the committee had just received — before authorizing further large appropriations or making enterprise-wide architectural decisions. The panel provided an overview of the state approach and progress, but several members said more standardized metrics and centralized visibility are still needed.","A House subcommittee heard agency CIOs and the Northwest Regional Data Center describe multi-year cloud modernization work funded by the Legislature, while members pressed for clearer inventories, cost analyses and data-transfer and disaster-recovery plans.","actionData","errors"]

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Department of State asks for funding to modernize Sunbiz and voter registration systems

Florida agencies report progress on cloud migration as lawmakers press for cost, inventory details